Australian surgical masks at Perth airport being sent to China on February 8

Australian surgical masks at Perth airport being sent to China

China stockpiled more than 2 billion surgical masks and essential medical supplies in a global panic buy now impacting the worldwide shortage of protective equipment.

The two billion masks and 25 million pieces of personal protective equipment (PPE) were imported from Australia and other overseas countries between January and March.

On Thursday, a Chinese government report detailing its foreign trade for the first two months of the year was uncovered, Daily Mail Australia reported.

When the Wuhan-originated virus was at its peak, the Chinese government went on a global campaign to recruit Chinese-owned companies in foreign countries to raid stocks of the items.

While Australia’s first COVID-19 infected person arrived on a plane from China on January 19, the virus had only just begun to spread globally when the big buy-up began.

China saw a “rapid growth in imports of commodities and key consumer goods” comprising 2.46 billion medical supply items.

These included masks, gloves, hand sanitiser, hazmat suits, ventilators and other materials.

The National Customs in China inspected the billions of items between January 24 and February 29, according to the report.

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It facilitated the rapid entry of supplies by scrapping customs clearance protocols for “epidemic prevention and control materials”.

This comes after news.com.au revealed a Chinese property company in Australia shipped more than 80 tonnes of masks and essential supplies.

Risland Australia airfreighted the hundreds of thousand of items in mid-February.

Another property company, luxury real estate giant Greenland, also sent back to China bulk medical supplies to China, redeploying its Sydney staff fro their roles to go out on a medical shopping spree.

Greenland is about 20 per cent owned by the Chinese government.

News.com.au also revealed that Chinese packaging company Crown Win is now targeting Australian businesses and offering them hundreds of thousands of masks in bulk sales.

candacesutton@news.com.au