India (ICIS): In response to demand from domestic end-user businesses that depend on imported raw materials, India has agreed to again extend the deadline for the certification of different chemicals imported into the country to March or April 2023.
As a non-tariff barrier against subpar imports, the Bureau of India Standards (BIS) certification requirement was expanded to include more chemical and petrochemical imports in 2019.
The Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers announced on 2 September that the effective date for BIS certification for acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), ethylene dichloride (EDC), and vinyl chloride monomer (VCM) will be postponed to 12 March 2023.
Paraxylene (PX), polycarbonate, and polyurethane certification criteria, meanwhile, would go into force on March 19 of the next year, it stated.
The BIS certification will go into effect on April 3, 2023, for ethylene vinyl acetate (EVA) copolymers, linear alkyl benzene (LAB), polyethylene (PE) material for moulding and extrusion, synthetic micro fibres, and other types of polyesters.
While the BIS implementation for pure terephthalic acid (PTA) was prolonged from 22 June to 22 December 2022, India's quality control standards accreditation for imported acetone was extended to 13 March 2023 in August 2022.
The mandatory BIS certification, which might have a significant impact on the
exports of completed goods, has faced fierce opposition from the plastics processing sectors.
“The Indian governments mulling the idea of implementing BIS standards on raw material will probably be the final straw for our industry considering the import dependency on polymers and the high raw material prices as compared to China and other countries,” he says.
“Such trade barriers will cut off the import flow of raw materials into the country,” Plexconcil executive director Sribash Dasmohapatra expressed.
