China CIQ Update
6 12 2007What is happening in China with the new CIQ procedures 3 months after the start of the new program to monitor frozen vegetables and fruits. What can we the importers expect? Delays and more delays are a constant problem. For us living in the JIT (Just In Time) world how does it impact us?
The problem we encounter now is the CIQ itself. Each CIQ office from the province, county, or city acts as an autonomous unit. What one province does or test another may or may not do. And the CIQ offices located at the ports do their own inspection. This means that we have at least two inspections prior to exportation or a minimum of two delays to our shipments and nothing ships with out the CIQ chop (signature) of approval.
If we look at the province of Zhejiang, the CIQ will inspect the cargo prior to exportation and check primarily for pesticide and microorganisms. This will cause delays for shipments as the supplier has to wait for the results from the CIQ who is not only inspecting their product but many others, which means delays in the labs to get results. And then we would have another inspection, such as Shanghai port, where the CIQ would check again to make sure all the documentation matches the manifest log itself.
For us living in the JIT world this means delays of minimum of 2 or 3 weeks for shipments. In the past, it took us from the time shipping instructions were given, to shipment of the goods, to arrival would be about 4 weeks to the west coast of the US. Now with the inspections we are looking at 6 to 7 weeks away from our customers. Inventory planning and control becomes more unpredictable.
Although the intent in China is to ensure food safety with the CIQ checks, it creates problems for us in the food supply chain to deliver in a timely JIT fashion to the customer. With more delays it means that the customers must increase their inventories to allow for delays or risk being out of stock. Either scenario is not good for the customer.
It is time for China to revisit their procedure and come up with a new method to increase the speed of monitoring and allow for JIT shipments once again. Until then we must learn to live with delays.
Technorati Tags: Noon International, CIQ, China, JIT
