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Building a free trade pilot zone is an important strategic measure for the CPC Central Committee with the Supreme Leader as the core to promote reform and opening up in the new era. This year marks the tenth anniversary of the construction of China’s Pilot Free Trade Zone. In the past ten years, their respective pilot free trade zones have implemented the decision-making arrangements of the CPC Central Committee, emancipated their minds, kept upright and innovated, launched a large number of basic and pioneering reform and opening-up measures, and formed many landmark and leading institutional innovations, effectively playing the role of a comprehensive experimental platform for reform and opening up.
Starting from today, this newspaper will open a column entitled "10th Anniversary Tour of Pilot Free Trade Zone Construction", which will fully report the course of China’s pilot free trade zone construction in the past 10 years, and reflect the new breakthroughs and progress made in the transformation of government functions, the strategy of serving the country, the liberalization and facilitation of investment and trade, and the financial openness and innovation to serve the real economy.
Recently, the General Secretary of the Supreme Leader made important instructions on further promoting the construction of the Pilot Free Trade Zone, stressing that in the new journey, on the basis of comprehensively summing up the ten-year construction experience, we should thoroughly implement the upgrading strategy of the Pilot Free Trade Zone, be brave in pioneering and tackling difficulties, explore in a wider field and at a deeper level, and strive to build a higher-level pilot free trade zone.
In September 2013, China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone was established. In the past ten years, the construction of China’s Pilot Free Trade Zone has been advancing all the way, and 21 pilot free trade zones have been set up in six batches, basically forming a new pattern of reform and opening up covering the east, west, north and south, and coordinating the coastal inland areas. In the new era and new journey, the respective trade pilot zones continue to change their concepts, bravely stand at the forefront of the times, comprehensively deepen reform and expand opening up, promote institutional innovation, and promote high-quality development.
There has been a new breakthrough in institutional innovation
Today, the products of South China University of Technology Industry Co., Ltd. have covered many overseas markets such as Asia, Europe, North America, South America and Oceania, thanks to various reform measures in Hubei Pilot Free Trade Zone.
For example, Zhang Xi, manager of the international business department of South China University of Technology, said: "Under the new mode of consolidated taxation, enterprises can first remove the goods and then pay taxes centrally within the prescribed tax payment period, effectively reducing the financial pressure on enterprises and reducing customs clearance costs." More than that, from "paperless" to "free filling", to "one-stop online" and finally to "one-day", the export tax rebate process has been continuously optimized and convenient. In 2022, the total export tax rebate of South China University of Technology reached 123 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 22%.
Since the establishment of the Pilot Free Trade Zone, it has shouldered the heavy responsibility of institutional innovation and reform breakthrough. In the past ten years, the respective pilot free trade zones have taken institutional innovation as the core, replicability and popularization as the basic requirements, and risk prevention and control as the bottom line, and made every effort to promote reform and opening-up innovation in related fields, exploring new ways and accumulating new experiences for comprehensively deepening reform and opening up.
Deepen the reform of the commercial system and stimulate the vitality of enterprises. Nansha District of Guangdong Pilot Free Trade Zone has realized "no appointment", "zero meeting", "all-weather", "paperless" and "intelligent" through the new mode of intelligent electronic registration. Through the implementation of standardized and intelligent declaration, the pass rate of self-declaration of enterprise name and the first application rate of electronic registration in the whole process all exceeded 90%, and the daily average business handling capacity of registrants increased by more than 30%. Applicants can print their own business licenses in 10 minutes at the earliest.
Accelerate the reform of trade facilitation and improve the timeliness of customs clearance. In the West Coast Comprehensive Bonded Zone of Qingdao Area in Shandong Pilot Free Trade Zone, 16 containers and 314 tons of imported cotton passed through the intelligent weighing platform, and the rapid weighing and certification were completed within half an hour. Qingdao Huangdao Port is the largest cotton import port in China, accounting for about 60% of the country’s imports. In order to improve the level of imported cotton trade facilitation, in August 2020, Huangdao Customs launched the "integrated inspection" supervision mode of imported cotton in Qingdao Free Trade Zone, integrating customs port quarantine, destination inspection, weight identification, sampling and inspection, and improving the convenience of imported cotton customs clearance.
On August 18th, China Ship Fuel Co., Ltd. completed the approval of a paperless business of direct supply of bonded fuel oil across customs areas. This batch of bonded fuel is delivered from Zhoushan oil depot, transported to Meishan Port Area of Zhoushan Port, Ningbo, and added to international navigation ships. Hangzhou Customs focused on the open development of the whole oil and gas industry chain, continued to deepen the regulatory reform, and helped Zhoushan area of Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone to build the largest large-scale petrochemical base, energy security base and oil and gas trading port in China.
Explore innovation in the financial sector and serve the development of the real economy. Since 2013, the State Administration of Foreign Exchange has tried 24 innovative measures for foreign exchange management in six batches of free trade trials, and copied and promoted nearly 20 measures nationwide in accordance with the principle of "mature one and copy one". In 2022, the cross-border revenue and expenditure of the Pilot Free Trade Zone increased by 14.7% year-on-year, 8.7 percentage points higher than that of the whole country.
Promote opening up and make new progress.
On the afternoon of September 1st, a remanufactured engine imported by Volvo Construction Equipment (China) Co., Ltd. for articulated off-highway dump trucks was declared at Shanghai Pudong Customs and delivered directly to the enterprise warehouse. "This engine is no less than a new product in terms of quality characteristics and safety and environmental protection performance. The smooth customs clearance of the first order of goods has reassured us to carry out the import business of overseas remanufactured products in the future. " Chen Chaoping, vice president of Volvo construction equipment service and spare parts, said.
At the beginning of the establishment of the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone, it set its sights on docking international high-standard economic and trade rules, took the lead in implementing the national treatment plus negative list management model before foreign investment access, and promoted the historical transformation of the investment management system. The development of Volvo in China is closely related to a series of policies of Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone to promote high-level opening to the outside world. Four years ago, the company completed the "first order" offshore trade in the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone, and then the company moved its Asian headquarters to Shanghai. Now Volvo has become the first crab-eating enterprise in the "Pilot Import of Remanufactured Products in Key Industries" in China.
Openness is a gene engraved in the bones of the Pilot Free Trade Zone. In the past ten years, the Pilot Free Trade Zone has been guided by a high level of openness, focused on exploring an institutional system that is in line with international economic and trade rules, systematically promoted reforms that conform to market rules, and achieved a series of breakthrough and leading innovations.
Since the Pilot Free Trade Zone launched the first negative list of foreign investment access in China, after seven reductions, the number of negative list items has been reduced from the initial 190 to 27, and the number of manufacturing items has been zero. In 2021, the first negative list of cross-border service trade was launched in Hainan to promote the better connection between China’s service trade management and international high-standard economic and trade rules. At present, the list has been well implemented in Hainan, which has become an important reform in the opening up of China’s service industry and laid a solid foundation for its implementation in a wider scope.
Differentiated exploration, opening up along the border has a new atmosphere. At Pingxiang Friendship Pass Port in Chongzuo Area of Guangxi Pilot Free Trade Zone, trucks loaded with fruits imported from ASEAN cleared customs in an orderly manner. Youyiguan Port is one of the most convenient land ports from China to Vietnam and other ASEAN countries. In order to ensure "zero delay" in fruit clearance in peak season, Youyiguan Port re-optimizes the traffic routes of inbound and outbound vehicles, and takes the lead in implementing "multi-card integration" of customs and border inspection departments at border ports across the country to share a bayonet, greatly shortening the traffic time of vehicles. In the first half of this year, ASEAN fruits imported through Youyiguan Port reached 381,000 tons, with a value of 11.39 billion yuan, up by 130.1% and 520.6% respectively.
"From promoting the upgrading of port energy level to promoting the construction of major open platforms, from promoting the development of industries with distinctive advantages to optimizing the port business environment, Guangxi will further give play to the policy advantages of the Pilot Free Trade Zone and promote the realization of high-level opening up." Bai Lan, full-time deputy director of the China (Guangxi) Pilot Free Trade Zone Office, said.
In 2022, 21 pilot free trade zones accounted for 18.1% of foreign investment and 17.9% of import and export trade in China, with less than four thousandths of land area, and further increased to 18.4% and 18.6% in the first half of this year.
High-quality development has achieved new results
On September 21st, the opening ceremony of Wazhou Wind Power Spindle Bearing Company was held in Dalian, Liaoning Pilot Free Trade Zone. The total investment of the project is 1 billion yuan, with a total construction area of 32,000 square meters. The new factory will intellectualize and digitize the traditional production process and management mode, and mainly build a series of fist products with high-end brand inheritance of Wazhou. It is estimated that the annual output of bearings will be 36,000 sets, with an annual output value exceeding 1.5 billion yuan.
Dalian Free Trade Zone gives full play to the advantages of equipment manufacturing technology and talents in the old industrial base in Northeast China and the advantages of pioneering and testing in the Pilot Free Trade Zone, and strives to cultivate and expand advanced equipment manufacturing industrial clusters. Now, it has formed a number of characteristic subdivisions such as CNC machine tools, refrigeration equipment, special containers, auxiliary power devices, nuclear power equipment and special motors. There are 154 advanced equipment manufacturing enterprises above designated size in the region, with an output value of 28.1 billion yuan in 2022.
In the past ten years, the respective pilot trade zones have actively promoted the development of new industries, new formats and new models, and built a number of industrial clusters with strong competitiveness, injecting new kinetic energy into high-quality development.
Create a public service platform and promote the agglomeration of new industrial elements. Nanjing Area of Jiangsu Pilot Free Trade Zone has built the first integrated circuit public service platform covering all production factors in China, highlighting demand orientation and transforming and upgrading the service industry. "The platform jointly provides all-factor services such as public technology, talent training and core machine linkage for integrated circuit enterprises in the Yangtze River Delta." Lin Qikun, member of the Party Working Committee of Nanjing Jiangbei New District and deputy director of the Management Committee, said that up to now, the platform has provided more than 13,000 public technical services, with a service amount of over 500 million yuan, supporting the research and development innovation of nearly 600 kinds of chip products.
In response to market demand, Nanjing Customs cooperated with the commercial department to formulate an implementation plan for enterprises in the Pilot Free Trade Zone to carry out bonded maintenance business according to the maintenance catalogue of the comprehensive bonded zone, and promoted the bonded maintenance policy to cover the Pilot Free Trade Zone.
Seize the new wave of digitalization and promote the vigorous development of new formats. In March of this year, Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone released the Action Plan for Promoting the Development of China (Zhejiang) Pilot Free Trade Zone (2023— 2027), clearly pointed out that it will build a leading digital economy industrial system, take the lead in integrating high-standard digital trade rules, and promote the establishment of a data-based system. Strive to increase the import and export volume of cross-border e-commerce to 420 billion yuan by 2027, the trade volume of digital services to 250 billion yuan, and the growth rate of added value of core manufacturing industries in the digital economy to maintain above 8%.
Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone has established a modern industrial system with six major industries as the core: China Core, Innovative Medicine, Intelligent Manufacturing, Blue Sky Dream, Future Car and Data Port. Tianjin Pilot Free Trade Zone has gathered strength to develop the financial leasing industry and become the second largest gathering place for aircraft leasing in the world. There are tens of thousands of oil and gas enterprises in Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone, and the scale of bonded fuel oil filling ranks fifth in the world. Hubei Pilot Free Trade Zone has gathered more than 16,000 optoelectronic information enterprises, making it the largest technology R&D and production base in the field of optical communication in China. There are more than 4,000 biomedical enterprises in Jiangsu Pilot Free Trade Zone, with an annual output value of over 400 billion yuan.
Standing at a new starting point, China Pilot Free Trade Zone is taking high-level opening as the guide, taking institutional innovation as the core, coordinating development and safety, connecting international economic and trade rules with high standards, deepening institutional opening, strengthening overall planning and system integration of reform, promoting the innovative development of the whole industrial chain, giving full play to the demonstration role of Pilot Free Trade Zone, and striving to make greater contributions to promoting Chinese modernization.
