As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 12th of April, 2020, almost 60 tonnes of protective equipment has arrived in Croatia by direct flight from China to help the country fight the coronavirus pandemic. Everything from masks, face shields, goggles and gloves to contactless thermometers, has landed in the country, Vecernji list reports.
Croatia has already procured 12.5 tonnes of equipment from China, but the landing of a Boeing 747 cargo plane with 600 cubic metres of cargo at Zagreb Airport marks the beginning of the establishment of an air bridge between the two countries, agreed during Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic's last telephone conversation with his Chinese counterpart, Li Keqiang.
Thus, direct flights from Shanghai to Zagreb will maintain a continuous supply chain for the health care system and other services. The Civil Protection Headquarters who are responsible for coordinating the fight against coronavirus, has been put in charge of distributing the delivered equipment.
The equipment purchased was also shipped with a donation from the Chinese Government. The direct acquisition, which is the result of a political summit agreement, has been made by two large state-owned companies in the country, Meheco and Sinopharm, and this marks an important political consensus at a time when protective equipment has become a valuable commodity.
For added security, Croatia also hired an aircraft from SF Cargo Airlines for the direct delivery of the protective equipment from Shanghai to Zagreb.
The purchased equipment is all fully certified. As of April the 1st, 2020, a new regulation on the export of medical equipment has been in force in China, under which goods cannot be exported unless they are properly certified and explicitly accepted by the consignee. Therefore, the boarding of the goods was monitored and the freight forwarder regularly sent photographs of the goods.
The Office of the President is directly involved in the procurement and coordinated the work of Beijing's institutions, ministries and embassies, which assisted in the field in connecting with companies and freight forwarders, collecting airfares and handling things on the Chinese market.
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