CSPA Foresees 95% Drop in Scrap Plastic Imported to China

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster): The scrap plastic imports to China are likely to witness huge decline in 2018, when compared with the previous year. According to estimate provided by the Beijing-headquartered China Scrap Plastics Association (CSPA), the scrap plastic imports into the country are likely to drop by 95% over the previous year.

Addressing the NPE2018 Conference recently held in Orlando, Florida, U.S., Steve Wong, executive president, CSPA noted that only 88.1 million pounds of plastic scrap have been allowed or approved by the Chinese authorities for importation until April this year. Based on this, the country’s authorized import permits for plastic scrap for recycling are likely to total only 375 million pounds in 2018, which is even less than 5% of the imports of 12.9 billion pounds during 2017.

The National Sword crackdown and the several measures that followed it have resulted in sharp decline in scrap plastic import volume. According to CSPA, almost 70% of the Chinese firms that relied on imports have already shut doors. Nearly 10% operate on available domestic scrap supply.

The remaining 20% of the companies have relocated their operations to other countries, especially to Southeast Asian countries such as Vietnam, Thailand and Malaysia. These facilities process the scrap into pellets, which are directly exported to Chinese manufacturing facilities, Wong said. However, this is likely to face near-term challenge, as Chinese authorities have already started stricter inspection of recycled pellet shipments at ports, on suspicions of mixing of unprocessed scrap with recycled pellets.

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CSPA highlighted the need for improving the plastics recycling rate across the world. As per estimates, only around 14% of the plastics consumed across the globe are recycled properly.