Taiwan has passed a law to allow the country’s freight forwarders to operate multi-country consolidation, which could see the amount of cargo through Taiwan increase by 600,000 tonnes and made the country a logistics hub for Europe, America and Southeast Asia.

In the past, local forwarders could only consolidate goods from various cargo containers according to their destination in a foreign country. The draft would allow the forwarders to carry out the consolidation and transshipment and re-export the goods from Taiwan, reports the shipping news website of Taiwanese media TSSDNews.

If goods are illegally removed or stolen during the process, the forwarders are liable to pay the import taxes of the removed or stolen goods. The forwarders, logistics companies and air cargo terminals operating outside of control areas who have registered with Taiwan’s customs are allowed to use their own seals on their cargo.

To reduce the impact on shipping companies, forwarders carrying out the consolidation will only be allowed to consolidate air cargo, ocean freight and re-export ocean freight first while ocean freight import and export may be opened in two years after the finance and transportation ministries amend related laws. The domestic consolidation is likely to create 2,000 logistics and warehousing jobs in the country.

The new law will make Taiwan the most competitive ocean and air freight hub in the world, said Michael Tai, chairman of Taiwan’s International Ocean Freight Forwarders and Logistics Association (IOFFLAT). Taiwan has a geographical advantage since 80% of global logistics and shipping services are within four hours of Taipei. Consolidating goods in Taiwan and re-exporting them to Europe and America will greatly increase efficiency and reduce costs, our Chinese-language sister paper Want Daily said.

(Source: Want China Times)