Relevant agencies to handle foreign product inspections after backlash to original plan

Industry

Published: 21 May. 2024, 18:05 Updated: 21 May. 2024, 18:41

Relevant agencies to handle foreign product inspections after backlash to original plan

Lee Jeong-won, center, the second vice minister of the Office for Government Policy Coordination, speaks on the government's new regulations on harmful substances found in overseas direct purchases in Seoul Sunday. [YONHAP]

Multiple government agencies will be assigned to inspect the safety of products purchased directly from overseas in a bid to beef up supervision.

Presently, the Korea Customs Service and the Seoul Metropolitan Government have primarily been responsible for checking for potential hazards within incoming products, but the rising number of packages from AliExpress and Temu has bogged them down.

Kids products and electrical and household items will be inspected by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, and consumer chemical products will be inspected by the Ministry of Environment. Should hazardous substances be detected during the inspection, the ministries in charge will request that the distribution and sale of the products be blocked.

The remedial measures come in response to a lack of systematic inspection and management processes under the current system.

Initially, safety inspections of cross-border products were limited to the Korea Customs Service, but that responsibility is now slated to shift to relevant agencies in hopes of raising the effectiveness of the inspection process.

Last year, there were over 100 million direct overseas transactions, but inspectors at the customs offices across the country numbered fewer than 300.

"The main purpose of the [original] measure was to find alternatives to review safety in the face of a surge in direct purchases," said an official at the Office for Government Policy Coordination in explaining the proposed requirement that 80 types of products, such as merchandise for children and electronic devices, purchased from foreign e-commerce platforms like Amazon, AliExpress and Temu obtain Korea Certification (KC) marks signifying that safety standards have been met.

"The government still cannot give up on strengthening public safety measures following the spike in overseas direct purchases,” the official added.

The KC-related mandate was announced on Thursday, only to be retracted four days later after an inundation of backlash from the public over concerns that it excessively limits consumer choices.

The presidential office apologized on Monday in response to the confusion caused among consumers. Sung Tae-yoon, director of national policy at the presidential office, said the government failed to fully consider the drawbacks of excessively restricting consumer choice and causing inconvenience to the people.

BY LEE HAY-JUNE, CHOI HAE-JIN [choi.haejin@joongang.co.kr]