The Shisha Charcoal Trade Glossary

By Mohamad Sinno, Charcoal Expert · Last updated 12 August 2026

38 terms, each defined the way you meet it: on a declaration, a certificate, a customs entry or a lab report. Every entry says what the term decides — not only what it means — and links to the page where this site applies it. Terms we have no page for are listed at the end rather than defined thinly.

Five terms that are wrong on offers you will receive

Start here, because these are the five that cost money. Each one appears regularly in supplier offers and specification sheets, and each is either not a thing, or no longer the thing it was.

• "UN 1361 certified." There is no such credential and no body that issues one. UN 1361 is a transport classification assigned to cargo, so a supplier claiming certification in it is describing something that does not exist — the five documents that do exist.
• "Non-hazardous" or "DG-exempt" charcoal. For sea freight this describes a route that closed on 1 January 2026. Charcoal is declared dangerous goods, and an offer still written the old way is quoting against a rulebook that no longer applies.
• "MSDS" offered as something other than an SDS. Same document, older name. What matters is whether Section 14 carries the right UN number, not which of the two words is printed at the top.
• "Platinum" or "Premium" as a grade standard. No standards body defines the tier names, and two suppliers use the same word for different ash ceilings. Compare measured numbers and named test methods instead.
• 4402.90 presented as the current code. Superseded for shell charcoal on 1 January 2022. On an old ruling it is correct and expected; on paperwork being filed today it needs explaining.

Dangerous goods classification

These eight terms decide whether a container can be booked at all. They come off the dangerous goods declaration and the carrier advisory, and four of them changed meaning on 1 January 2026.

UN 1361

The UN transport classification for carbon of animal or vegetable origin — the entry coconut shell charcoal ships under at sea. It is a classification assigned to cargo under the IMDG Code, not a credential. No authority issues a UN 1361 certificate to a supplier.

Decides: Whether the shipment moves as declared dangerous goods at all. · what UN 1361 and IMDG 42-24 mean for a charcoal booking

Class 4.2

The IMDG hazard class for substances liable to spontaneous combustion. Fresh charcoal oxidises in air and generates heat faster than a sealed container sheds it, which is why UN 1361 sits in this class rather than with the flammable solids of Class 4.1.

Decides: The placard, the stow, and every carrier condition attached to the booking. · the self-heating chemistry behind Class 4.2

Proper shipping name (PSN)

The description the IMDG Code fixes for an entry, which is not the trade name of the goods. On a UN 1361 shipment it reads CARBON, animal or vegetable origin. The word "charcoal" in that field is the entry DG desks reject first.

Decides: Whether the declaration is accepted or returned. · the charcoal DGD, field by field

Packing group

A ranking of danger within a class — I highest, III lowest. UN 1361 is listed in the Dangerous Goods List under both II and III, and a consignment’s group is set by its self-heating test result. Untested material must be assigned to at least Packing Group III.

Decides: The packaging specification and one field on the declaration. · why the test result, not the grade, sets the packing group

Special Provision 978 (SP 978)

The IMDG special provision holding charcoal’s carriage conditions: weathering before packing, a temperature ceiling on the packing day, and headspace in the stow. It is a set of conditions for carrying the goods, not a route out of carrying them as dangerous goods.

Decides: What the factory must do and evidence before a container can be sealed. · SP 978 clause by clause, each mapped to its evidence document

IMDG Amendment 42-24

The revision of the IMDG Code that became mandatory on 1 January 2026. It removed charcoal’s test-out route and replaced Special Provision 925 with SP 978, so coconut charcoal now ships as declared Class 4.2 with no exemption available.

Decides: Which edition of the rulebook a current shipment is judged against. · the old and new rules compared cell by cell

UN N.4 self-heating test

The laboratory test measuring whether a substance self-heats under defined conditions. It still sets a consignment’s packing group. Since 42-24 a passed result no longer exempts UN 1361 from the Code — SP 978 states in terms that the test shall not be used to exempt it.

Decides: Packing group only. Never exemption, whatever an older certificate says. · what a pre-2026 N.4 certificate still proves

Headspace

The clear space SP 978.6 requires between the top of the stow and the container roof: 30 cm, graded softer for a stack under 1.5 m or for 16 m³ blocks spaced 15 cm apart. Packing tight to starve the cargo of oxygen is the instinct the rule overrides.

Decides: How the container is actually loaded on the packing day. · the packing-day order: temperature, headspace, stack height

The document set

Six documents, plus the body that issues one of them. No one of these substitutes for another, and a term here almost always names a piece of paper somebody has to sign.

Dangerous goods declaration (DGD)

The shipper’s signed declaration that the cargo is correctly classified, packed, marked and labelled for carriage. On a charcoal booking it carries the proper shipping name, class and packing group, and — since 42-24 — the production date, packing date and packing-day temperature.

Decides: Whether the carrier will load the container. · every DGD field and the errors DG desks reject

Weathering certificate

Weathering is the open-air hold that ages fresh charcoal after pyrolysis and before it is sealed; the certificate is the producer’s signed record of it. It states production, weathering and packing dates, the packing-day temperature, and carries dated yard photographs.

Decides: Acceptance at gate-in. A packing date earlier than production plus 14 days voids it. · the photo spec and the six failures carriers catch

Safety data sheet (SDS, still labelled MSDS)

The sheet stating a substance’s hazards, handling and transport data. "MSDS" is the older name for the same document, not a different one. For coconut shell charcoal, Section 14 has to read UN 1361, Class 4.2 — and the CAS number is the coconut-shell charcoal entry, not elemental carbon.

Decides: Whether the sheet agrees with the declaration and the bill of lading. · the transport fields an SDS is checked against, and three sheets that fail

Vanning survey

An independent check of how one container was stuffed, made by someone other than the shipper, with photographs as its output. The surveyor is photographed with identification against the container number — the proof a shipper’s own photographs cannot give.

Decides: What evidence exists if the cargo is damaged and a claim follows. · each shot a vanning surveyor takes and what it proves

Certificate of origin (Form B)

The document stating where goods were produced. Indonesia’s non-preferential form is Form B, used for every destination unless the buyer claims preference under a trade agreement, in which case that agreement’s own form applies instead.

Decides: Duty treatment at entry, and whether a preference can be claimed. · which certificate-of-origin form each destination needs

IPSKA

The designation for an agency appointed by Indonesia’s Ministry of Trade to issue certificates of origin. It matters because the certificate is issued by an appointed IPSKA agency rather than by a chamber of commerce on its own authority.

Decides: Whether the certificate you were sent came from a body entitled to issue it. · who issues an Indonesian certificate of origin

Certificate of analysis (COA)

A statement of what a laboratory measured in one named sample, on one date, under a named test method. A specification sheet states a band the factory intends to hold. Only the first is evidence, and it describes the batch it was drawn from and nothing else.

Decides: What you can actually enforce after the container lands. · our three lab reports, and how to check any supplier’s numbers

Commercial and freight terms

General trade glossaries define these for any commodity. The definitions below say what each one does on a charcoal booking specifically, which is usually something the general definition does not mention.

EXW, FOB and CIF

Incoterms allocating cost and risk between seller and buyer. On a charcoal shipment they do something else first: the term decides which party is the shipper on the dangerous goods declaration, and therefore who signs it at the port of loading. This factory quotes EXW Factory, FOB Tanjung Priok and CFR.

Decides: Who carries the dangerous-goods obligation, not just who pays the freight. · who signs the DG declaration under each term

Minimum order quantity (MOQ)

The smallest order a supplier will produce and ship. For charcoal it is normally expressed in containers rather than kilos. Ours is 1 × FCL (20 ft or 40 ft).

Decides: Whether an enquiry is worth opening on either side. · shapes, sizes and the commercial terms behind the MOQ

FCL and LCL

A full container load is booked to one shipper; a part load is consolidated with other cargo. What fits is decided by shape: a 20 ft container fills to volume before it reaches its weight limit, and a 40 ft does the opposite.

Decides: How much charcoal you actually receive per booking. · payload per container by briquette shape

Demurrage and detention

Demurrage is charged while a container sits in the terminal beyond its free time; detention runs while the box is outside the terminal. They are two separate clocks, and a customs hold can pause one while the other keeps billing.

Decides: The cost of a delay — and, separately, the deadline for a cargo claim. · the claim deadlines in sequence

Dangerous goods surcharge

A carrier-set charge added to base freight for hazardous cargo, also billed as a hazardous cargo fee or an IMO surcharge. A published tariff is one line’s rate for one trade, and it is not binding until the booking is confirmed.

Decides: A landed-cost line that a quote for ordinary cargo will not show you. · the DG cost stack, dated and sourced

Landed cost

The ex-works price plus origin haulage and export clearance, ocean freight, cargo insurance, duty on a reconstructed customs value, import tax, and destination brokerage and port fees — then divided by the container’s net payload for a per-kilo figure.

Decides: Whether one supplier’s quote is genuinely cheaper than another’s. · one 20 t container costed line by line

Customs, tariff and registry terms

The terms on the entry paperwork and on a supplier’s registration documents. Two of them — 4402.20 and 4402.90 — describe the same goods at different dates, which is the single most common source of contradictory advice in this trade.

HS code / 4402.20

The Harmonized System code is the six-digit classification customs authorities share worldwide. Coconut shell charcoal is 4402.20, the shell-or-nut subheading the World Customs Organization created in the HS 2022 revision, carved out of what had been 4402.90. Digits beyond the sixth are national.

Decides: The duty line your entry is filed under. · each market’s code and duty status, dated

4402.90

The residual wood-charcoal line used before the 2022 revision carved shell and nut charcoal out into 4402.20. It still appears legitimately on older customs rulings and on live paperwork, which is why two documents about the same goods can disagree without either being fraudulent.

Decides: Whether a document citing it is simply older, or actually wrong today. · why the CBP ruling shows the old code

Importer of record

The party legally responsible for the entry — the declared classification, the valuation and the duty. It is not the factory and it is not the forwarder. In the United States that responsibility sits on the importer under 19 U.S.C. §1484.

Decides: Who is liable when the code on the entry turns out to be wrong. · who owns the 4402 declaration

Binding classification ruling

A customs authority’s written decision on how specific goods are classified. It reaches only the transaction it describes, so a ruling issued on someone else’s cubes binds nothing about yours unless your goods match the description in it.

Decides: Whether a supplier’s cited ruling is evidence for your entry or decoration. · the duty-free basis, and exactly who it covers

ISF 10+2

The US Importer Security Filing: ten data elements from the importer and two from the carrier. 19 CFR 149.2 splits the ten across three deadlines rather than one, and four of them sit on the factory’s side of the table.

Decides: A penalty exposure that opens before the vessel loads. · the three ISF deadlines and which elements the factory owes

Lacey Act declaration

A US import declaration for plant products. Heading 4402 has sat on the APHIS implementation schedule since 1 October 2009, so a charcoal entry trips the message set — but APHIS exempts coconut, so the correct response to the flag is a disclaimer rather than a declaration.

Decides: Which code goes in the ACE filing, and whether you file at all. · 4402 listed, coconut exempt — and the code to disclaim with

MPF and HMF

The Merchandise Processing Fee and the Harbor Maintenance Fee: US charges assessed on an entry independently of the duty rate. A tariff line marked Free does not make the entry free of them.

Decides: Why a duty-free classification still produces a bill from customs. · the full US cost picture beyond the duty rate

NIB (Nomor Induk Berusaha)

Indonesia’s single business identification number, issued through the OSS system. It proves that a company is registered. It does not prove a kiln, a press or a yard — a trading company with no production at all holds a perfectly valid one.

Decides: That the entity exists. Nothing whatever about what it can make. · which registry checks a foreign buyer can actually run

NPWP

An Indonesian taxpayer registration number. Sixteen digits is the only form now issued, while the older fifteen-digit format still appears on documents and in at least one government search box — so one taxpayer can look like two different numbers.

Decides: Which form of the number to type into a registry check. · the free check that proves export registration

KBLI

Indonesia’s standard classification of business fields. The code printed on a supplier’s NIB says which activity that company is licensed for: KBLI 20115 covers manufacturing coconut shell charcoal, KBLI 46610 covers wholesaling it.

Decides: What the entity is registered to do — documentary. Not a verdict on its own: exporters commonly hold a wholesale code. · reading the KBLI code on a supplier’s NIB

Laboratory parameters

The rows on a charcoal certificate of analysis. Each one is a percentage that changes something a buyer or a lounge notices, and the last two are here mainly to explain an absence.

Proximate analysis

The four-parameter breakdown a charcoal COA reports: moisture, volatile matter, ash and fixed carbon. It is read as a set rather than one line at a time — fixed carbon and volatile matter in particular are two views of the same carbonisation.

Decides: How completely the material was carbonised. · the four parameters and what each one changes

Ash content

The mineral residue left after combustion, reported as a percentage. It drives how often a bowl is emptied and how much sediment a customer sees, and it rises with shell contamination and with binder share. It is the parameter most buyers specify first.

Decides: The ceiling worth writing into a contract and enforcing against a report. · our measured ash figures and the bands suppliers publish

Fixed carbon

The share of the material that burns as heat once moisture and volatiles have gone. It is the closest single proxy for how completely the charcoal was carbonised, which is why it should be read alongside volatile matter rather than on its own.

Decides: Heat output, indirectly — and whether carbonisation was carried far enough. · fixed carbon and volatile matter read as a pair

Volatile matter

What leaves the briquette as gas early in the burn. High volatiles show up as smoke and smell at ignition — the complaint a shisha lounge hears first, and the reason incomplete carbonisation is a commercial problem rather than a technical footnote.

Decides: Smoke and odour in the first minutes after lighting. · what each parameter actually changes

Moisture content

Affects ignition, and it is weight you pay for at the per-kilo price. It also moves after the factory: charcoal reabsorbs moisture in transit, so the figure measured at the plant is not the figure at your warehouse.

Decides: The one parameter on which a factory COA overstates what arrives. · why packaging barrier and condensation decide the difference

Calorific value

Heat released per unit of mass, in kcal/kg, measured with a bomb calorimeter. It appears on most charcoal specification sheets. We publish no figure for it: none of our laboratory reports includes a calorimetric test, so there is no measured number to state.

Decides: Whether a published kcal/kg figure has a test behind it. Ask which. · the three figures we do not publish, and why

ASTM D1762-84

The standard test method for the chemical analysis of wood charcoal, and the method behind a proximate analysis. It defines how to measure the material. It does not define grade names, which is why a tier label has no standard behind it.

Decides: Whether two suppliers’ numbers can be compared at all. · the method, the laboratories and the accreditation behind our figures

What this glossary does not define, and why

A term earns an entry here only when this site has a page that applies it to charcoal. That rule excludes several terms you would reasonably expect to find: letter of credit, T/T, proforma invoice and golden sample on the commercial side, and the SABER, SCoC, BICON and EUDR conformity regimes on the import side. We can define them, but the definition would be the whole of what we had to say, and a general trade dictionary already does that better.

They are on the build list rather than omitted permanently, and each will appear here when the page that applies it does. If a term you are looking at is not on this page — on a declaration, an offer or an entry summary — send it to us and we will tell you what it decides: WhatsApp +628213924038.

These definitions are general information on charcoal trade documentation, not legal, customs or dangerous-goods advice. Regulatory terms carry their sources and dates on the pages linked from each entry. Confirm current requirements with your broker, your carrier or a licensed dangerous-goods specialist before filing or shipping.