Party and State: Chinese Importer Cancels 300,000 Orders for Hairy Crabs

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Chinese Importer Cancels 300,000 Orders for Hairy Crabs

Spotting that the Germans have a surplus of hairy crabs and don't hold them in the same esteem as the Chinese, one enterprising Taobao store owner decided to import a load of them. Receiving nearly 300,000 orders for them, and the fact that Germans detest the crustaceans so much they sell them for the same price that the Chinese sell cabbage per kilo, there was a obviously a metric shitload of money to made.

That is, until someone from the China’s General Administration of Quality Supervision pointed out that hairy crabs are actually live animals and are subject to the same quarantine rules as anyone else looking to import any other kind of animal. The oversight has cost the site, juhuasuan.com, more than 9 million Yuan ($1.47 million), including the 30% added on to the refunds that the 20,000 customers will be entitled to.

China's General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said it did not give any permission for importing German hairy crabs to China. But the importer insisted that the German authorities had issued a quarantine certificate. The German company involved in the deal got the original production place certificate while the Chinese importer only needed an import and export clearance.

In a statment, the CEO of the company, Zhang Jianfeng simply said “We are sorry about the German hairy crab issue. We screwed it up."