Category: Country Guides

Importing Products to Israel: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Chuiyan Mo — Leave a comment

Import to Israel

Planning to import products from China, Vietnam or elsewhere to Israel? In this article, we cover what importers must know about Israeli import duties, customs processes, product regulations, labeling requirements, permits, and shipping.

  • Trade Agreements
  • Import Duties
  • Value Added Tax (VAT)
  • Electronics Safety Standards
  • Toy Safety Standards
  • Labeling requirements
  • Licenses and Permits
  • Shipping from China to Israel
  • List of China to Israeli Freight Forwarders

Continue reading Importing Products to Israel: A Complete Guide

Importing Products to the UAE: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Chuiyan Mo — 3 Comments

Importing Products to the UAE

Planning to import products to the United Arab Emirates? In this article, we explain what every UAE-based importer must know about duties and other import taxes, product regulations, labeling requirements, shipping, and ports.

Import Taxes in the UAE

Thanks to the Law of Unified Custom Tariffs, the seven emirates of UAE share the same importing regulations for most of the products. There are three kinds of taxes levied upon the imported products in the UAE: customs duty, value-added tax, and excise tax. Continue reading Importing Products to the UAE: A Complete Guide

Importing from China to Switzerland: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Vincent Cheng — 1 Comment

Complete Guide-Importing from China to Switzerland

Need help on importing goods from China to Switzerland? Confused by the fact that Switzerland is in Europe but is not a member of the EU?

Since many regulations are only published in French, German and Italian languages (i.e. Switzerland official languages), sometimes it might be difficult to find specific information about regulations in the English language.

While you can find thousands of documents online and spend nights reading about the topic, we decided to write this guide to save you time and make your life easier.

In this article, we will guide you through the requirements and regulations that you must know before importing products from China to Switzerland. In particular, we will cover the following topics:

  • Switzerland-China Free Trade Agreement
  • Switzerland Product safety regulation
  • Switzerland Labeling Requirements
  • Import Taxes
  • Import licenses and permits
  • Shipping from China to Switzerland

Note: It is impossible to break down every detail in this article. Instead, our goal is to provide an overview and index for you to better understand the general rules when importing goods from China to Switzerland and links to the main regulations that apply in the country.

Switzerland-China Free Trade Agreement (FTA)

Let’s start with the Free Trade Agreement that was signed between Switzerland and China in 2013. This FTA explains the requirements when importing goods from China.

What is the Free Trade Agreement?

In short, it is an agreement that states the terms of the cooperation among the two countries, in order to reduce trade barriers such as import quotas and tariffs.

Therefore, it’s important for any Switzerland’s importer to know what are the benefits of this agreement.

We outlined the key point of this agreement for you:

Continue reading Importing from China to Switzerland: A Complete Guide

Importing from China to New Zealand: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Chinaimportal (Hong Kong team) — 4 Comments

Importing from China to New Zealand

Thinking about importing goods all the way from China to New Zealand but don’t know how to start? In this article, you will learn about the importing process from China to New Zealand:

    • New Zealand Product Safety Standards
    • Labeling Requirements
    • Import Taxes
    • Import Licenses and Permits
    • Selling on Amazon from New Zealand

Continue reading Importing from China to New Zealand: A Complete Guide

Product Safety Standards & Labeling in Canada: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Fredrik Gronkvist — 6 Comments

Canadian Product Regulations

Consumer product safety standards and labeling laws and regulations are designed to ensure the safety of consumers in Canada. They provide a detailed guideline and safety requirements (and more) to sellers, manufacturers, and dealers who want to import goods to Canada.

To import, manufacture, advertise or sell a product in Canada, you must possess certifications, lab tests, compliance with the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act, Consumer Packaging, and Labeling Act, and other regulations based on the type of product you want to import or manufacture.

In this article, I have provided detailed information about the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act, also known as CCPSA, what it means for importers, and what is required if you want to import products to Canada.

What is Canada Consumer Product Safety Act?

Canada Consumer Product Safety Act was passed as a law by the government in 2010 and went into effect in 2011 to ensure the safety of Canadian consumers. With proposed changes to the Hazardous Products Act (HPA), it replaced the 40 years old HPA with new regulations and amendments.

According to the act, all consumer products in Canada must be regulated under the Canada Consumer Product Safety Act (CCPSA). The law was proposed after the growing consumer complaints about the safety of consumer products in the country.

As the HPA was not amended for the last 40 years, it failed to provide safety and protection against many modern products and gadgets, especially toys. There was a need for a new act with a set of modern regulations and laws to ensure public safety.

Under the new act, manufacturers and importers are now required to obtain safety information in the form of mandatory checks, tests, and certifications (if required by the inspectors from Health Canada), to meet the requirements of Canada Consumer Product Safety Act (CCPSA).

The CCPSA is designed to prohibit the importers and manufacturers from importing, manufacturing, selling, and even advertising consumer products that are in any way poses danger to safety and health of humans.

The new act along with also Consumer Packaging and Labeling Act prohibits importers and manufacturers to misrepresent a product, misguide or mislead consumers.

Health Canada is responsible to enforce the CCPSA regulations and amendments within the borders of Canada. The inspectors from Health Canada have an authority to inspect any product and ask seller, importer, or manufacturer to provide certificates or test results to ensure compliance with CCPSA. Continue reading Product Safety Standards & Labeling in Canada: A Complete Guide

Importing from China to Singapore: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Fredrik Gronkvist — 4 Comments

Suggestion: Watch the 10 minutes video tutorial before reading this article

Singapore is a country that’s punching far above its weight. With a population of only 5.4 million, the size of its economy is on par with many of its far bigger southeast Asian neighbors.

Singapore (if we exclude Australia) is also our primary market in Asia, both in terms of website visitors and the number of customers.

In this article, we give you an overview of Importing from China to Singapore. Keep reading, and learn more about Singaporean product safety, import duties, required permits and taxes.

Singaporean Product Safety Requirements

SPRING (The Standards, Productivity and Innovation Board) is a business development agency, partly tasked with protecting Singaporean customers from unsafe products.

Some products are covered by one or more Consumer Goods Safety Requirements (CGSR).

This includes, but is not limited to, the following product categories:

  • Children’s Products
  • Toys
  • Watches
  • Clothing and textiles
  • Furniture and beddings

As explained by this FAQ, suppliers (i.e., a Singapore based import business) are responsible for immediately halting sales if a product is deemed as unsafe.

So, what practical implications does this have for importers in Singapore? Continue reading Importing from China to Singapore: A Complete Guide

Importing from China to the UK: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Fredrik Gronkvist — 6 Comments

Suggestion: Watch the 10 minutes video tutorial before reading this article

About to Import products from China to the United Kingdom? Eager to know how the ‘Brexit’ will affect your business?

Read this guide to learn what you must know about product regulations, labelling requirements, import duties and VAT in the United Kingdom.

We also explain why UK based importers should not worry too much about the country’s departure from the European Union. Well, at least in the mid to long term.

Important Note: As of now, this guide applies to importers in all EU member states. Thus, the UK is interchangeable with any other EU country. That is, of course, until we create an updated version of this country guide in 2018.

British Product Safety Regulation

As the United Kingdom is (still) part of the European Union, EU wide standards and directives are mandatory.

Below follows an overview: Continue reading Importing from China to the UK: A Complete Guide

Importing from China to India: A Complete Guide

Posted on by Fredrik Gronkvist — 49 Comments

Import to India

India is not only a rapidly developing country but also the fastest-growing market for Chinaimportal. In terms of visitors on Chinaimportal.com, India is the only second to the United States. Thus, we decided it was about time to dedicate our weekly article to our Indian readers out there, and of course to everyone else with an interest in importing from China to India.

What makes importing to India different?

India is, by all means, a developing country. However, its product regulations and labeling requirements are fairly well established. Then there’s the bureaucracy, that makes confirming applicable product safety standards, labeling requirements and getting the cargo through customs rather complicated. But, that’s about as far as the differences go, as compared to other countries. Continue reading Importing from China to India: A Complete Guide