Customs seizure of smuggled steel scraps

At 22:00 on June 4, under the command of GACC, the Guangdong Sub-Administration and 17 Customs Districts jointly launched special operations to disrupt smuggling exports of steel scraps. The anti-smuggling officers were divided into 363 action teams to simultaneously carry out raids  in Tianjin, Hebei, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Hunan, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, and Hainan provinces. Till 9:00 a.m. on June 5, the operations totally wiped out 65 smuggling rings, seizing 245 criminal suspects and a large number of physical and docomentary evidences. The cases were valued at 4.8 billion Yuan in total.

Based on preliminary investigation, the smuggling rings were suspected of smuggling a total of 2.41 million tons of steel scraps from China to Southeast Asian countries including Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia by low-price declaration frauds.

Steel scraps, a high-quality renewable resource, are the only raw material that can replace iron ore to manufacture steel products. Therefore, China imposes a 40% tariff on their export for restrictions.