The Chinese government has finished issuing the first two rounds of solid waste import licenses for 2018, with copper scrap import license numbers and tonnages both more than 94% lower.
The first round of licenses was granted in late December 2017, with the second round granted this week - all for imports delivered in 2018. According to official files obtained by Metal Bulletin, copper scrap (HS code 7404.0000.10) import volumes granted in the first two rounds total 136,685 tonnes, down 94.3% from 2,397,565 tonnes approved in the first two rounds of 2017, mainly due to fewer companies securing a license so far. For those ones that have received a license (see table below), granted volumes have been cut by 81% from last year's levels. Almost all of the companies that received copper scrap import licenses so...