The Customs Department has proposed a ban on the import of iron scrap, or a tightening of controls on the import of iron scrap by requiring a certificate from country of origin stating that there is no electronic waste among the iron scrap.
The proposal was raised during discussions with the Pollution Control and Industrial Works departments to prevent the import of industrial and electronic waste being falsely declared as mixed metal.
Customs officials at Laem Chabang deep-sea port in Chon Buri have recently impounded 14 cargo containers declared as mixed metal. The decision follows raids on the rented warehouses of a company in Rayong province.
Customs officials reported that the 14 containers weighed a total of 323.307 tonnes. Nine containers were bound for warehouses in Rayong and the rest for Prachin Buri.
Panu Limwongyuti, director of the customs office at Laem Chabang port, said that the Based Action Network (BAN) had claimed that 720 cargo containers, alleged to contain industrial waste, had arrived at Laem Chabang.
He said that 440 containers did not arrive in Thailand. 75 of 89 containers found to contain dangerous substances have been returned to their countries of origin, 14 have been impounded for litigation and only 18 containers are being kept at the port.
Since the start of the 2025 fiscal year, the customs office in Laem Chabang port has seized 209 containers, weighing 4.6 million kilogrammes and turned back 134 containers found to contain hazardous substances.
Panu admitted that imports of metal scrap, such as iron, copper and aluminium, have been rising, totalling more than 7.83 million tonnes, worth over 213 billion baht, in the past three years.
Due to the limitations of X-ray machines, he said that officials are constrained in their ability to check all arriving containers and have resorted to randomly screening high-risk containers.
He added that opening all containers to check their contents is not possible due to manpower and time restrictions.
