The General Office of the State Council has recently forwarded the Implementing Opinions on Further Reducing Logistics Costs (the "Opinions") released by the National Development and Reform Commission ("NDRC") and the Ministry of Transport ("MOT").
The Opinions roll out policy measures in six respects: 1. deepening reforms of key steps to reduce the institutional logistics costs; 2. strengthening the security of land and capital to reduce logistics costs in production factors; 3. fully delivering tax and fee cuts measures to reduce logistics costs in taxes and fees; 4. improving information openness and sharing to reduce logistics costs in information; 5. promoting the effective interconnectivity between logistics infrastructure to reduce logistics costs in multi-modal transport; and 6. advancing quality and efficiency enhancement to reduce overall logistics costs. Among others, the Opinions urge efforts to put in place the preferential policies on taxes and fees for the logistics area, including halving the urban land use tax on land used for storage of bulk commodity; lower the road tolls and the charges for rail freight and air freight; and enhance regulation of fee-charging practices in the logistics area. Additionally, the Opinions stress that public information on logistics may be made public, without prejudice to information security.