Yantai Customs' intelligent supervision helps import copper concentrate to have a good start

In the first two months of this year, Yantai Customs, under the supervision of Qingdao Customs, imported copper concentrate with a value of 6.55 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 40%, ushering in a "good start".

Copper concentrate, as the core raw material for copper smelting, is widely used in many basic industries such as power, construction, and transportation. At the same time, it plays an indispensable role in emerging industries such as wind power and new energy vehicles, as well as new infrastructure fields such as 5G communication and data centers. In recent years, with the continuous increase in copper demand, the import quantity of copper ore and its concentrate has been constantly rising.

Many of the copper concentrates imported by our company are shipped in containers, which require lifting, unpacking, and reshipment at the port under the traditional inspection mode, resulting in long demurrage and high costs. Wang Jun, the commercial manager of Shandong Hengbang Smelting Co., Ltd., also pointed out the pain points of the traditional inspection mode for imported copper concentrates.

To solve this problem, Yantai Customs actively explores and innovates the new model of "smart transfer inspection", and constructs a three in one regulatory system of "pre screening+port fast inspection+on-site inspection". Under the new model, customs conduct risk assessment and analysis on imported container copper concentrates before they arrive at the port. Upon arrival, radioactive testing and solid waste screening are carried out at the terminal yard. After passing the inspection, the goods can be lifted out of the terminal and sent to the enterprise's dedicated site for unpacking, sampling, and inspection, greatly reducing the time of goods being detained at the port.

This not only reduces the dwell time and cost of copper concentrate at the dock, but also benefits enterprises in better allocating raw materials, "said Zhang Chunbo, the head of the Inspection Department of Yantai Customs. Through the application of intelligent supervision systems, intelligent customs locks, automatic unsealing equipment and other technical means, the automatic recording of the trajectory of copper concentrate in transit, automatic weight comparison, and intelligent summary have been achieved. Taking Shandong Hengbang Smelting Co., Ltd. as an example, its copper concentrate customs clearance process reduces cargo damage by an average of more than 5 ‰, shortens the time at port from 10 days to 2 days, and saves approximately 1300 yuan in operating costs per container.

Zhang Chunbo stated that Yantai Customs will continue to deepen the construction of smart customs and smart ports, improve the mechanism for ensuring the import of bulk commodities, strengthen the advantages of bulk commodity aggregation at Shandong ports, and help Shandong build a hub for the allocation of bulk commodity resources in the north, injecting strong impetus into the high-quality development of the local economy.