SIRIM Certificate of Approval for plastic waste imports

Who can apply

The importer needs a valid manufacturing licence approved by MITI covering the plastic type, or an ICA 10 exemption letter issued by MIDA. A general trading licence does not qualify.

The facility also needs a Management of Imported Scrap and Waste (MISW) licence and demonstrated in-house processing capability — either waste management facilities or a standard recycling line.

Purity and contamination

The guidelines require near-total homogeneity of plastic types, commonly applied at 99.5% purity, with non-plastic contamination limited to a low single-digit percentage. Landfill-origin material, food contamination, oil residue and e-waste are excluded.

Imported volume is capped by a quota derived from SIRIM’s inspection of actual plant capacity, and annual audits verify that declared capacity matches real throughput.

Pre-shipment inspection

Every consignment needs a pre-shipment inspection report before the CoA is issued. Two routes are accepted:

• Type 1: SIRIM, or a SIRIM-approved Foreign Inspection Body, inspects at origin.
• Type 2: a SIRIM-approved Materials Recovery Facility self-inspects and uploads the report during CoA submission.

Origin country restriction

Material may only come from Basel Convention parties, or from countries with a bilateral, multilateral or regional agreement with Malaysia on plastic waste. The United States is not a Basel party, so US-origin plastic waste is effectively excluded.

What we hold, and what you should ask for

We operate under a manufacturing licence, MISW licence and ISO 14001 certification, and we handle CoA documentation on our side for material we buy. Before you book freight to any Malaysian buyer, ask for the licence number and the inspection route — it is the difference between a discharged container and a returned one.