[SMM Analysis] South Korea Plans to Strengthen Copper Scrap Export Declaration, Will the Flow of Copper Scrap Trade in Asia Change?
[SMM Analysis: South Korea Intends to Tighten Export Declaration for Copper Scrap; Will Asia's Copper Scrap Trade Flows Change?] In mid-July, South Korea's Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment released a notice on cross-border waste management, proposing to include steel scrap and non-ferrous metal scrap, previously exempt from declaration, into the scope of export declaration. The South Korean government is pushing this adjustment mainly to crack down on the misdeclaration of valuable scrap for export. Previously, there had been multiple instances in the market where high-value resources such as electronic waste and copper scrap were declared as ordinary steel scrap before export. South Korean authorities specifically mentioned a case in August 2024 in which copper scrap was falsely declared as steel scrap and smuggled for export to China.