A neighbour’s lane, and what that changes
Bangladesh is close enough to India that the calculation a buyer makes is different from the one made in Europe or the Americas. On a long lane you hold months of stock because the cost of running out is worse than the cost of the capital. On a short one you do not have to. You can order smaller lots more often, keep less money sitting in a warehouse, and re-order when a job runs ahead of plan instead of when the forecast said you would.
That only works if the panel is the same every time. Our group has pressed plywood at Perumbavoor, Kerala since 1986, about 40 km from Cochin Port, and every shipment carries the material guarantee: the same thickness, the same bond, the same construction as the specification sheet you approved. Consistency is what makes a short lane worth using; without it you are just buying more often.
We quote FOB Cochin in USD. Your forwarder books the carriage and names the discharge port, which keeps our figure a clean panel price you can compare against any other origin, including a local one.
What we ship to Bangladesh
The core of this lane is packing material for exporters — the plywood that holds a crate together and the crate itself — with furniture and interior grades alongside it.
| Product | Grade / spec | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Packing-grade plywood | MR bond, IS 303 | 6, 8, 12, 15 and 18 mm are the usual thicknesses. The workhorse for cases, crating and industrial packing. |
| Plywood boxes and crates | Built under an ISPM-15 compliant process | Made to your internal dimensions and delivered ready to pack, for exporters who would rather buy packaging than build it. |
| Plywood pallets | Four-way entry; deckboards in packing ply or sawn rubberwood | Solid-wood components treated and ISPM-15 stamped where the cargo is export-bound. |
| Commercial plywood | MR and BWR | Furniture, shopfitting, doors and general joinery. |
Also available on the same container: BWR hardwood plywood where the crate faces a long onward voyage, film-faced shuttering plywood for formwork, marine plywood to IS 710 BWP, and sawn timber — rubberwood and jackwood runners for packing work. Mixed loads are ordinary on this lane.
Import essentials for Bangladesh
What your clearing agent needs to land a plywood shipment in Bangladesh. We quote FCA or FOB Cochin in USD; customs duty and any import tax are added at import, on your side of the transaction, not ours.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| HS code | Heading 4412. The national item within 4412.31, 4412.33, 4412.34 and 4412.39 turns on panel construction and individual ply thickness as well as face species; finished cases, pallets and drums are generally considered under 4415. Your broker confirms the line, and we state the code we ship under on the commercial invoice. |
| Customs duty and import tax | Not quoted by us and not in our price. Your clearing agent confirms the tariff line and the rate in force. Import tax is not charged on CIF alone: the base is the customs value plus customs duty, and local law may add excise, fees and other incidental charges. Bangladesh applies a Customs Duty of 25% on CIF value under HS heading 44.12, the same rate for India-origin plywood as for any other origin. VAT is 15%, charged on CIF value plus Customs Duty and any Regulatory or Supplementary Duty that applies. |
| Preferential origin | We do not give customs rulings and will not promise a duty outcome. What we do is confirm the HS code each product ships under and prepare the Certificate of Origin a preference claim needs. Whether any concession applies to your line, and on what rules-of-origin conditions, is a question for your clearing agent — ask it before you order, not after. None currently applies. Bangladesh and India are both SAFTA members, but HS heading 44.12 is on Bangladesh’s SAFTA sensitive list for non-LDC members, which excludes plywood from the preferential tariff — the full 25% Customs Duty above applies regardless of origin. |
| Clears at | The discharge port you nominate. We sell FOB Cochin, so your forwarder books the carriage and names the port; it then goes on the proforma invoice. |
| Standards and certification | Nothing is included by default. Each mill holds its own BIS licence, so no single CM/L number covers everything we sell; any certificate or test report that applies to your order is named on the quotation by holder, number and product scope. FSC chain of custody or a CE Declaration of Performance has to be asked for at enquiry — it decides which mill your order is placed with and cannot be added after the panels are pressed. BSTI (Bangladesh Standards and Testing Institution) mandatory certification: BDS 799:2006 for general-purpose plywood, or BDS 18:2006 specifically for tea-chest plywood. A BSTI import clearance against the relevant standard is required before Bangladesh Customs releases the consignment. |
| Documents we provide | Commercial invoice, packing list with net and gross weights, and the Bill of Lading with every shipment. A Certificate of Origin where the destination, bank or contract requires one. A treatment or fumigation certificate only where that treatment was actually carried out, and a phytosanitary certificate only where the commodity or destination rules call for one. |
| ISPM-15 | Plywood panels are exempt — processed wood, no stamp and no fumigation certificate. Solid-wood packing such as pallets, runners and bearers does fall under the standard, and ours is treated and stamped. |
| Container weight | We load to the lower of the ship-line payload and the road weight limit at your end. The general ship-line payload is about 26.7 tonnes into a 40ft; the figure that applies to your booking is confirmed on the proforma invoice. |
| Typical transit from Cochin | 21 days port to port to Chattogram (Chittagong), Bangladesh — always via transshipment, chiefly through Colombo, since no direct service runs on this lane. Chennai is a few days faster on the same routing, around 18 days, but Cochin’s 21-day figure is the number to plan against for this origin. |
Terms, documents and turnaround
Export quotes are in US dollars under Incoterms 2020, and always name the place the term applies to. FCA Cochin is normally right for a sealed container handed to your carrier; FOB Cochin applies where we deliver on board the vessel you nominate. CFR and CIF are quoted where agreed at enquiry.
Payment is 50 per cent advance with the order and the balance before dispatch for standard products, and 100 per cent advance for custom specifications, by bank transfer (T/T). The bank beneficiary name always matches the legal seller named on the proforma invoice; if details ever reach you in another name, or through a channel other than the signed proforma invoice, stop and call the number on this site before remitting anything.
Pre-shipment inspection is welcome, by you or any third-party agency you appoint, and we hold the goods for it. You get photographs and video of your container as it loads, and a packing list with the same net and gross weights we declare to the shipping line. The registrations behind the selling entity, each with the portal you can check it on yourself, are on verify us before you pay.