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SCIO briefing on promoting high-quality development: General Administration of Customs

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Xinhua Finance:

We have noticed that the central government in recent years has made a series of arrangements for coordinated regional development. What are the highlights of foreign trade development in relevant regions across the country? And what policies and measures has Chinese customs introduced to support coordinated regional development? Thank you.

Zhao Zenglian:

Let's invite my colleague Mr. Lin to answer these questions.

Lin Shaobin:

Thanks for your questions. Coordinated regional development is the internal requirement for achieving high-quality development. Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, the CPC Central Committee has made more long-term and systematic strategic planning and overall arrangements for coordinated regional development, which has promoted both historical achievements and changes in coordinated regional development within the country, and has also injected surging momentum into Chinese modernization.

From the perspective of foreign trade, benefiting from the implementation of the national coordinated regional development strategy, regional foreign trade development is constantly moving towards a more balanced, higher level and higher quality direction, and each region also presents its own characteristics, complementary advantages and strengths.

The eastern region has borne the burden, contributing more than 70% to the country's foreign trade growth. The central and western regions have accelerated their development, with the average annual growth rate of imports and exports 4.5 percentage points higher than the national average. The imports and exports of the three northeastern provinces have set new records, reaching a historical high of 1.23 trillion yuan in 2023. In the first half of this year, imports and exports in the eastern, central and western regions and the three northeastern provinces all realized growth.

In particular, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, the Yangtze River Delta and the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area have all played the important role as a source of foreign trade. The total foreign trade volume of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region has crossed two-trillion-level mark, reaching a record high of 5.03 trillion yuan in 2023. With less than 4% of the country's land area, the Yangtze River Delta region has created more than one-third of the country's import and export value. Industrial clusters in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area have outstanding advantages. In 2023, the nine mainland cities in the Greater Bay Area exported nearly 50% of the country's household appliances, nearly 80% of 3D printers and more than 90% of unmanned aircraft.

Chinese customs have aligned with the strategic deployment of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council's coordinated regional development, and has strongly supported coordinated regional development over the years. We have adopted a category-based and region-specific approach based on the unique advantages of different regions.

For example, we have established a unified "green channel" for key enterprises in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region to develop key industries such as biomedicine, integrated circuits and artificial intelligence. We have vigorously promoted customs clearance facilitation in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, thus continuing to promote the reform of "combined ports" and "one port link" to connect inland ports with hub ports and "sea ports" to the "doorsteps" of enterprises through rivers. Taking Shunde's export of home appliances as an example, the logistics time has been shortened from seven days to about two days. We have also worked hard to create a favorable environment for foreign trade entities in developed regions with export-oriented economies, such as the Yangtze River Economic Belt and the Yangtze River Delta. We strongly support the opening of ports and the establishment of new comprehensive bonded zones in the central and western regions to create more and better platforms for local high-level opening up.

Next, we will introduce more and better targeted measures in accordance with the strategic deployment of coordinated regional development proposed by the third plenary session of the 20th CPC Central Committee. We will work together with everyone to draw a grand picture of coordinated regional development covering eastern, central and western China as well as synchronizing southern and northern China. Thank you!