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Express transportation company FedEx has temporarily halted shipments from China into India as cargo piles up at Indian airports following intense inspections by Customs authorities.
“The situation is quite critical and out of control for FedEx at airports across India because the cargo has not been cleared for the past 3-4 days. There is a huge pile-up of shipments, resulting in a backlog and we are trying our best by talking to the Customs officials. We don’t know how long it will take,” said a senior FedEx official.
Last week, DHL Express India Pvt Ltd, the Indian airfreight unit of German logistics giant Deutsche Post DHL, said it was “temporarily suspending” import shipments from mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau due to recent delays in Customs clearance of cargo into India.
Since last week, India’s importers have complained of slow clearance of cargo by Customs at airports and seaports, which many say is linked to the border dispute between the two countries.
“Lately, Customs authorities at several ports are doing 100 per cent examination of goods originating from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. This has created undue delay in clearance of imported shipments of inputs which are meant for manufacture of garments for exports,” Apparel Export Promotion Council (AEPC) Chairman A Sakthivel said in a letter to Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC) Chairman M Ajit Kumar.
“It is affecting factory operations as inputs are held up at ports and exporters are in fear that they will fail to meet the delivery schedule,” Sakthivel said.
AEPC said businesses were gearing up to get back to normal after the relaxation of the lockdown in India and other foreign countries. However, the delay in clearing import consignments from China was adding to the crisis.
The apparel industry depends on several inputs that are domestically not available or do not meet the buyers’ specifications. So far, such imports were subject to random and partial checks only, the AEPC said.
“The situation at all airports and seaports at Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, Bengaluru, Kolkata, Tuticorin and others is precarious as there is inordinate delay on all import consignments which are held up due to 100 per cent open examination by Customs, who are not processing documents for shipments originated from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan,” Sakthivel said.
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