Is Imported Pet Food Always Detained? Customs Clearance Traps That 90% of People Don't Know

Ms. Li, who was browsing her phone late at night, suddenly found that the imported cat food she bought through a daigou had been "lying" in the customs for half a month; Mr. Zhang's German dog food, which he bought at a high price, was finally returned due to quarantine issues. With the surging demand for imported pet food, the customs clearance process is becoming a blind spot where pet owners are most likely to fall into traps. This article will unveil the layers of mystery surrounding the customs clearance of imported pet food and tell you how to avoid those invisible "minefields".

A bag of pet food that has traveled across the ocean needs to break through three hurdles: quarantine approval, on-site inspection, and label review. Taking the customs clearance case library of Zhongshitong as an example, among the products returned in 2023 due to excessive ingredients, 38% contained animal-derived ingredients prohibited in China, and 29% of the packages lacked Chinese labels.

• Quarantine Minefield: Raw materials such as poultry meat and by-products of cattle and sheep need to provide official quarantine certificates from the exporting country.
• Ingredient Red Line: China clearly prohibits the use of growth promoters such as ractopamine.
• Label Trap: The words "Pet Food" and the proportion of raw materials must be marked.

When individual daigou are still in a flurry of paying additional taxes, professional institutions have already compressed the customs clearance time by 72% through pre-classification and advance declaration. The express channels established by companies like Zhongshitong can achieve:

• Complete the application for quarantine permits within 3 working days.
• The intelligent system automatically matches the HS code, and the tariff error rate is less than 0.5%.
• Full-process traceability management, and the response time for sudden inspections is less than 2 hours.

Even if you entrust a customs clearance company, these key points still need to be checked personally:

• Log in to the official website of the General Administration of Customs to query the access list and confirm that the production factory is in the record-filing directory.
• Require the supplier to provide the original ingredient test report (issued by a CNAS-certified laboratory).
• Check whether the minimum sales package has the laser anti-counterfeiting CIQ mark.

With the deepening of the RCEP Agreement, emerging categories such as Thai cat cans and New Zealand venison food are rapidly entering the market through the cross-border e-commerce B2C model. However, it is worth noting that the pet feed hygiene regulations implemented from 2024 will impose more stringent standards on vitamin additives.

When you are choosing imported rations for your furry kid, you might as well ask first: Has this package of food really gone through all the compliant paths? Welcome to share your cross-border shopping experiences in the comment section or leave a message to consult about those customs clearance issues that puzzle you.