Import compliance for refrigerated trucks: where to check, by country
Vehicle import requirements are set by the destination country, change without notice, and are not harmonised across Africa. This page does not restate them. It gives the official authority for each market we could verify, the six questions that decide the paperwork anywhere, and one rule we read verbatim on Kenya’s own site — because it changes the clearance route for a new truck.
Six questions that determine the paperwork in any market
These do not depend on the country, so they do not go out of date. Take them to your clearing agent before you place an order, not after the container sails.
| # | Question | Who has the answer |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Is this vehicle type on the mandatory conformity list? | National standards body |
| 2 | Is conformity assessed pre-shipment or on arrival? | National standards body or its appointed agent |
| 3 | Is product registration required, per-shipment certification, or both? | Same authority |
| 4 | How long is the certificate valid, and is an annual fee required? | Same authority |
| 5 | Is there a maximum vehicle age, counted from first registration? | Customs or standards body |
| 6 | Are there emission-stage, right-hand-drive or special-vehicle pre-approval rules? | Transport or environment authority |
The authority to check, per market
Right-hand column is the authority’s own site, opened and confirmed on the date shown. We link to the authority rather than to a summary of its rules, because a summary is where the errors come from.
| Market | Authority | Official site | Verified |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nigeria | Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) | son.gov.ng | 2026-10-26 |
| Tanzania | Tanzania Bureau of Standards (TBS) | tbs.go.tz | 2026-10-26 |
| Ghana | Ghana Standards Authority (GSA) | ghanastandards.org | 2026-10-26 |
| Kenya | Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS) — main site, inspection/PVoC, standards centre | kebs.go.ke · inspection.kebs.go.ke · standards.kebs.go.ke | 2026-10-27 |
One warning that saves time: the old Kenyan address
kebs.org no longer serves the Bureau. It resolves to an empty hosting app whose
certificate does not match the name, so browsers block it. KEBS now runs on the government domain
kebs.go.ke — use that. Several articles still link to the dead address.
Algeria’s standards body could not be reached from our side during verification, so no link is published for it. A wrong link is worse than no link: it sends a buyer to a page that is not the authority, and they will not check twice.
Kenya: new vehicles are exempt from PVoC — this is the rule that matters most to us
This is the only destination-country rule on this site that we restate, and we restate it because we can quote it verbatim from the authority’s own page, with the legal notice that grants it.
Pursuant to the provisions of Legal Notice No.78 of 28th April 2020; All new motor vehicles and new mobile equipment are exempted from PVOC requirements on condition that they are accompanied with a Manufacturer’s warranty or type approval Certificate. Therefore, new motor vehicles and mobile equipment are cleared based on provision of a valid Manufacturer’s warranty or type approval Certificate.
— Kenya Bureau of Standards, “Destination Inspection”, section viii: Processing and clearing of Motor vehicles, spare parts and mobile equipment. inspection.kebs.go.ke/destination-inspection/, retrieved 2026-10-27. Quoted verbatim, including the original capitalisation.Three things follow, and only three:
One further observation, from the same page rather than from any summary: KEBS publishes a list of origins whose goods are inspected on arrival instead of pre-shipment, and China is not on it. Goods from China therefore fall under PVoC by default — the motor-vehicle exemption above is what changes the route for a new truck, and it is why we lead with the type-approval documents rather than with an inspection agent.
Terminology, because these two get mixed up constantly: Kenya’s PVoC certificate is a CoC (Certificate of Conformity); the used-vehicle roadworthiness certificate is a CoR (Certificate of Roadworthiness). Neither is a Chinese CCC certificate, and we do not present them as interchangeable.
What this page deliberately refuses to state
Fees, age limits, emission stages and validity periods are the four things every “Africa import guide” online quotes and almost none can source. We do not quote them at all.
Three statements, in this order
These three sentences are the whole disclaimer, and they are deliberately not buried in small print at the bottom of the page.
- Import requirements are set by the destination country and change without notice.
- This page links to the official authority for each market; it does not interpret or restate their requirements.
- Confirm the current requirement with that authority or with your clearing agent before shipment. Requirements quoted elsewhere, including elsewhere on this site, are indicative only as of the date shown.
Additional markets are added only after the authority’s own site has been opened and confirmed. We would rather list four markets we have checked than twelve we have copied.
The rest of the reference set
Tell us the port and the vehicle, and we will tell you what we can supply
We can supply the manufacturer’s warranty and the type-approval documents for every model in our range. We cannot supply a Kenyan CoC, and we will not claim to. If your clearing agent needs a specific document, ask us before the order rather than after — that is the whole point of this page.
Send the destination port and the model. We will reply with the documents we hold and the ones your importer will need locally.
Ask about your marketSources and verification. Official sites in Table 2 were opened directly and confirmed on the dates shown (HTTP GET, redirects followed, 25-second timeout). The Kenyan quotation is from inspection.kebs.go.ke/destination-inspection/, retrieved 2026-10-27, and is reproduced verbatim. No fee amount, age limit, emission stage or certificate validity period from any source has been reproduced on this page. Last verified 2026-10-27.
Zhejiang Miaosheng Automobile Co., Ltd. · No.38 Yonghe East Road, Leidian Town, Deqing County, Huzhou, Zhejiang, China · Page last verified 2026-10-27.