Overall Plan for the Development of the Hainan Free Trade Port
Overall Plan for the Development of the Hainan Free Trade Port
Overall Plan for the Development of the Hainan Free Trade Port
June 1, 2020
Hainan is the largest special economic zone in China, with unique advantages in regard to deepening reform on all fronts and experimenting with opening-up policies of the highest level. Supporting Hainan to gradually explore and steadily promote the construction of a free trade port with Chinese characteristics and establishing a free trade port policy and institutional system in stages and phases are major initiatives of reform and opening up personally planned, led and promoted by General Secretary Xi Jinping. It is a strategic decision made by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China ("CPC") in the light of the overall domestic and international situations and based on in-depth study, overall consideration and scientific planning. Today's world is undergoing a new round of major development, great change and profound readjustment, with protectionism and unilateralism rising and economic globalization encountering greater headwinds and undertows. Building a free trade port in Hainan is a fundamental requirement for promoting high-level opening up and establishing a new system for an open economy; an urgent need of deepening market-oriented reform and creating a law-based, internationalized and convenient business environment; a strategic choice of implementing new ideas of development, promoting high-quality development and building a modern economic system; and concrete action to support economic globalization and build a shared future for mankind. This Plan is formulated with a view to thoroughly implementing the guiding principles which General Secretary Xi Jinping set forth in his important speech at the Conference Celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the founding of Hainan Province and the Hainan Special Economic Zone, carrying out the requirements of the Guiding Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Supporting Hainan in Fully Deepening Reform and Opening up, and speeding up the construction of a high-level free trade port with Chinese characteristics.
I. General Requirements
(I) Guiding thought. We will follow the guidance of Xi Jinping's Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, comprehensively implement the guiding principles of the 19th CPC National Congress and the second, third and fourth plenary sessions of the 19th CPC Central Committee, adhere to the overall leadership of the Party, the general guideline of seeking progress while maintaining stability, new ideas of development and high-quality development, pursue coordinated progress in the five-sphere integrated plan and balanced progress in the four-pronged comprehensive strategy, benchmark against high-level international economic and trade rules, liberate thoughts, make bold innovations, focus on the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment, establish a policy and institutional system suitable for a high-level free trade port, create a special area of customs supervision with international competitiveness and influence, and build the Hainan Free Trade Port into a shining flag and an important open portal which leads China's opening up to the outside world in the new era.
(II) Basic principles
-- Learning from international experience. We will adhere to planning at a high starting point and high-standard construction, actively adapt to the new trend of reconstruction of international economic and trade rules, fully learn from the advanced operational modes, management methods and institutional arrangements of international free trade ports, form opening-up policies and institutions with international competitiveness, accelerate the establishment of a new system for an open economy, enhance the role of regional radiation and driving, and establish a frontier zone of China's deep integration into the global economy.
-- Reflecting Chinese characteristics. We will adhere to the centralized and unified leadership of the Party, the road of socialism with Chinese characteristics and people centrism, practice the core values of socialism, and ensure the correct direction of construction of the Hainan Free Trade Port. We will give full play to our institutional advantages of having the whole country as a single entity and concentrating resources to accomplish major undertakings, mobilize the enthusiasm and creativity of all parties, gather premier factors of production worldwide, and strive to make new breakthroughs in promoting institutional innovation, cultivating growth drivers and building a new pattern of comprehensive opening up, so as to provide solid support for the realization of national strategic goals. We will strengthen exchanges and cooperation with Southeast Asian countries and promote linked development with the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
-- Conforming to the positioning of Hainan. We will closely focus on the strategic positioning which the State has granted to Hainan to build itself into a pilot zone for deepening reform and opening up on all fronts, a pilot national ecological zone, an international tourism and consumption center and a major national strategic logistics zone, give full play to Hainan's rich natural resources, unique geographical location, proximity to a supersized domestic market and hinterland economy and other advantages, seize the important opportunities of a new round of global scientific and technological revolution and industrial change, focus on the development of tourism, modern services and high-tech industries, and accelerate the cultivation of new advantages of cooperation and competition with Hainan characteristics.
-- Highlighting reform and innovation. We will strengthen the consciousness of reform and innovation, give Hainan greater autonomy over its reform, support it to vigorously promote reform and innovation in an all-round way, actively explore and establish more flexible and efficient laws and regulations, regulatory models and management systems that adapt to the construction of a free trade port, and make great efforts to remove institutional and mechanism barriers that hinder the flow of factors of production. We will deepen opening up based on flows of goods and factors of production, accelerate the promotion of opening up based on rules and related institutions, and drive an all-round deepening of reform through high-standard opening up; and strengthen the systematic integration of reform, focus on coordinated promotion, make innovative measures in all aspects cooperate with and complement each other, and improve the overall efficiency of reform and innovation.
--Adhering to bottom-line thinking. We will adhere to proceeding steadily and step by step, make effective overall arrangements for the pace and progress of opening up, launch policies one by one wherever they are mature, and not rush for quick results or seek quick success or instant benefits. We will deepen efforts to streamline administration, delegate powers, combine power delegation with tightened oversight, optimize services, comprehensively implement an institutional system of convenient access and process regulation in accordance with the law, and establish regulatory standards, specifications and institutions that are in line with the international practice. We will strengthen the identification of major risks and the prevention of systematic risks, and establish and improve supporting measures for risk prevention and control; perfect the system and mechanism for the prevention and control of major epidemics, and improve the public health emergency management system; and carry out normalized assessment work, rectify deviations and correct errors in a timely manner, and ensure the right direction of construction and sound development of the Hainan Free Trade Port.
(III) Development goals
By 2025, a free trade port policy and institutional system will basically have been established, focusing on the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment. The overall business environment will be brought to the first-class level in China, the number of market entities will be substantially increased, industrial competitiveness will be significantly improved, powerful and effective risk prevention and control mechanisms will be in place, laws and regulations will be gradually perfected to adapt to the construction of a free trade port, and the quality and efficiency of economic development will be markedly enhanced.
By 2035, the free trade port system and operation mode will be more mature. Trade and investment rules characterized by freedom, fairness, rule of law and high-level process supervision will be basically established to realize free and convenient trade, free and convenient investment, free and convenient cross-border flow of capital, free and convenient access for people and free and convenient transportation, as well as secure and orderly flow of data. The business environment will be more optimized, the system of laws and regulations will be sounder, the risk prevention and control system will be more rigorous, and a pattern of modern social governance will be basically formed, with Hainan becoming a new highland of China's open economy.
By the middle of the century, a high-level free trade port with strong international influence will have been fully built.
(IV) Scope of implementation. The scope of implementation of the Hainan Free Trade Port will cover the entire island of Hainan.
II. Institutional Design
Taking the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment as the focus, the free, orderly, secure and convenient cross-border flow of various factors of production and a modern industrial system as the support and special tax system arrangement, efficient social governance system and sound legal system as the safeguards, we will establish a policy and institutional system for the Hainan Free Trade Port under the premise of specific division of labor and mechanism measures and adhering to the bottom line of no occurrence of systemic risks.
(I) Free and convenient trade. Under the premise of effective supervision, we will build a special area of customs supervision with independent customs operations in the whole island. For trade in goods, an institutional arrangement for liberalization and facilitation with the basic feature of "zero tariff" will be implemented. For trade in services, policy measures of liberalization and facilitation with the basic characteristic of "allowing both access and operation" will be taken.
1. Having free flow through the "front line". We will set up a "front line" between the Hainan Free Trade Port and other countries and regions outside the customs territory of the People's Republic of China. For the entry (exit) link of the "front line", we will strengthen the supervision of safe entry (exit), and enhance control of public health security at ports, as well as biosafety, food safety, and product quality and safety at national gateways. Under the premise of ensuring the fulfillment of the obligations stipulated in the international treaties concluded or acceded to by China, we will draw up a list of goods and items prohibited or restricted from import and export in the Hainan Free Trade Port, while allowing the free entry and exit of goods and items not on the list, with customs supervision in accordance with the law. We will formulate a catalog of commodities subjected to import duties at the Hainan Free Trade Port, and exempt goods outside of the catalog from import tariffs when entering the free trade port. Transhipped goods delivered under bills of lading will be free from tax and inspection, while goods and items departing from the Hainan Free Trade Port will be administered as for exports. We will implement convenient and efficient customs supervision and build a high-standard "single window" for international trade.
2. Exercising effective control at the "second line". We will establish a "second line" between the Hainan Free Trade Port and other regions within the customs territory of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as "Inland"). When goods are moved inland from the Hainan Free Trade Port, relevant formalities will be in principle handled in accordance with provisions on imports, and tariffs and import-linked taxes will be levied in accordance with regulations. For goods which are produced by encouraged industrial enterprises but do not contain imported materials or parts or contain imported materials or parts whose added value from processing in the Hainan Free Trade Port exceeds 30% (inclusive), no import tariff will be levied on them when they move inland through the "second line", but import value-added tax and consumption tax will be imposed on them in accordance with regulations. Postal items that move inland from the Hainan Free Trade Port will be supervised in accordance with provisions and taxed in accordance with regulations. Import administration will be streamlined for means of transport departing from the Hainan Free Trade Port to inland. Goods, items and means of transport entering the Hainan Free Trade Port from inland will be subjected to administration in accordance with domestic circulation regulations. No customs declaration formalities will be needed for the transhipment of inland goods to inland via the Hainan Free Trade Port. Instead, they should be loaded and unloaded at operational venues (sites) under customs supervision in the free trade port, stored separately from other goods under customs supervision, and conspicuously marked. Venue-operating enterprises shall, according to the needs of customs supervision, transmit to customs offices information on the entry/exit of goods into/from venues, etc.
3. Implementing free production and operation for enterprises on the island. Customs offices will implement targeted supervision of low intervention and high efficiency over enterprises and institutions in the Hainan Free Trade Port, and realize free production and operation for enterprises in the free trade port. For transit goods that are shipped from abroad but are reloaded, sorted and assembled at the Hainan Free Trade Port and then transported to other countries or regions, the customs formalities will be simplified. No storage period will be set for goods in the Hainan Free Trade Port, and storage locations can be selected freely. For goods with "zero tariff", customs offices shall exempt them from routine supervision.
4.
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June 1, 2020
Hainan is the largest special economic zone in China, with unique advantages in regard to deepening reform on all fronts and experimenting with opening-up policies of the highest level. Supporting Hainan to gradually explore and steadily promote the construction of a free trade port with Chinese characteristics and establishing a free trade port policy and institutional system in stages and phases are major initiatives of reform and opening up personally planned, led and promoted by General Secretary Xi Jinping. It is a strategic decision made by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China ("CPC") in the light of the overall domestic and international situations and based on in-depth study, overall consideration and scientific planning. Today's world is undergoing a new round of major development, great change and profound readjustment, with protectionism and unilateralism rising and economic globalization encountering greater headwinds and undertows. Building a free trade port in Hainan is a fundamental requirement for promoting high-level opening up and establishing a new system for an open economy; an urgent need of deepening market-oriented reform and creating a law-based, internationalized and convenient business environment; a strategic choice of implementing new ideas of development, promoting high-quality development and building a modern economic system; and concrete action to support economic globalization and build a shared future for mankind. This Plan is formulated with a view to thoroughly implementing the guiding principles which General Secretary Xi Jinping set forth in his important speech at the Conference Celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the founding of Hainan Province and the Hainan Special Economic Zone, carrying out the requirements of the Guiding Opinions of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and the State Council on Supporting Hainan in Fully Deepening Reform and Opening up, and speeding up the construction of a high-level free trade port with Chinese characteristics.
I. General Requirements
(I) Guiding thought. We will follow the guidance of Xi Jinping's Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, comprehensively implement the guiding principles of the 19th CPC National Congress and the second, third and fourth plenary sessions of the 19th CPC Central Committee, adhere to the overall leadership of the Party, the general guideline of seeking progress while maintaining stability, new ideas of development and high-quality development, pursue coordinated progress in the five-sphere integrated plan and balanced progress in the four-pronged comprehensive strategy, benchmark against high-level international economic and trade rules, liberate thoughts, make bold innovations, focus on the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment, establish a policy and institutional system suitable for a high-level free trade port, create a special area of customs supervision with international competitiveness and influence, and build the Hainan Free Trade Port into a shining flag and an important open portal which leads China's opening up to the outside world in the new era.
(II) Basic principles
-- Learning from international experience. We will adhere to planning at a high starting point and high-standard construction, actively adapt to the new trend of reconstruction of international economic and trade rules, fully learn from the advanced operational modes, management methods and institutional arrangements of international free trade ports, form opening-up policies and institutions with international competitiveness, accelerate the establishment of a new system for an open economy, enhance the role of regional radiation and driving, and establish a frontier zone of China's deep integration into the global economy.
-- Reflecting Chinese characteristics. We will adhere to the centralized and unified leadership of the Party, the road of socialism with Chinese characteristics and people centrism, practice the core values of socialism, and ensure the correct direction of construction of the Hainan Free Trade Port. We will give full play to our institutional advantages of having the whole country as a single entity and concentrating resources to accomplish major undertakings, mobilize the enthusiasm and creativity of all parties, gather premier factors of production worldwide, and strive to make new breakthroughs in promoting institutional innovation, cultivating growth drivers and building a new pattern of comprehensive opening up, so as to provide solid support for the realization of national strategic goals. We will strengthen exchanges and cooperation with Southeast Asian countries and promote linked development with the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.
-- Conforming to the positioning of Hainan. We will closely focus on the strategic positioning which the State has granted to Hainan to build itself into a pilot zone for deepening reform and opening up on all fronts, a pilot national ecological zone, an international tourism and consumption center and a major national strategic logistics zone, give full play to Hainan's rich natural resources, unique geographical location, proximity to a supersized domestic market and hinterland economy and other advantages, seize the important opportunities of a new round of global scientific and technological revolution and industrial change, focus on the development of tourism, modern services and high-tech industries, and accelerate the cultivation of new advantages of cooperation and competition with Hainan characteristics.
-- Highlighting reform and innovation. We will strengthen the consciousness of reform and innovation, give Hainan greater autonomy over its reform, support it to vigorously promote reform and innovation in an all-round way, actively explore and establish more flexible and efficient laws and regulations, regulatory models and management systems that adapt to the construction of a free trade port, and make great efforts to remove institutional and mechanism barriers that hinder the flow of factors of production. We will deepen opening up based on flows of goods and factors of production, accelerate the promotion of opening up based on rules and related institutions, and drive an all-round deepening of reform through high-standard opening up; and strengthen the systematic integration of reform, focus on coordinated promotion, make innovative measures in all aspects cooperate with and complement each other, and improve the overall efficiency of reform and innovation.
--Adhering to bottom-line thinking. We will adhere to proceeding steadily and step by step, make effective overall arrangements for the pace and progress of opening up, launch policies one by one wherever they are mature, and not rush for quick results or seek quick success or instant benefits. We will deepen efforts to streamline administration, delegate powers, combine power delegation with tightened oversight, optimize services, comprehensively implement an institutional system of convenient access and process regulation in accordance with the law, and establish regulatory standards, specifications and institutions that are in line with the international practice. We will strengthen the identification of major risks and the prevention of systematic risks, and establish and improve supporting measures for risk prevention and control; perfect the system and mechanism for the prevention and control of major epidemics, and improve the public health emergency management system; and carry out normalized assessment work, rectify deviations and correct errors in a timely manner, and ensure the right direction of construction and sound development of the Hainan Free Trade Port.
(III) Development goals
By 2025, a free trade port policy and institutional system will basically have been established, focusing on the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment. The overall business environment will be brought to the first-class level in China, the number of market entities will be substantially increased, industrial competitiveness will be significantly improved, powerful and effective risk prevention and control mechanisms will be in place, laws and regulations will be gradually perfected to adapt to the construction of a free trade port, and the quality and efficiency of economic development will be markedly enhanced.
By 2035, the free trade port system and operation mode will be more mature. Trade and investment rules characterized by freedom, fairness, rule of law and high-level process supervision will be basically established to realize free and convenient trade, free and convenient investment, free and convenient cross-border flow of capital, free and convenient access for people and free and convenient transportation, as well as secure and orderly flow of data. The business environment will be more optimized, the system of laws and regulations will be sounder, the risk prevention and control system will be more rigorous, and a pattern of modern social governance will be basically formed, with Hainan becoming a new highland of China's open economy.
By the middle of the century, a high-level free trade port with strong international influence will have been fully built.
(IV) Scope of implementation. The scope of implementation of the Hainan Free Trade Port will cover the entire island of Hainan.
II. Institutional Design
Taking the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment as the focus, the free, orderly, secure and convenient cross-border flow of various factors of production and a modern industrial system as the support and special tax system arrangement, efficient social governance system and sound legal system as the safeguards, we will establish a policy and institutional system for the Hainan Free Trade Port under the premise of specific division of labor and mechanism measures and adhering to the bottom line of no occurrence of systemic risks.
(I) Free and convenient trade. Under the premise of effective supervision, we will build a special area of customs supervision with independent customs operations in the whole island. For trade in goods, an institutional arrangement for liberalization and facilitation with the basic feature of "zero tariff" will be implemented. For trade in services, policy measures of liberalization and facilitation with the basic characteristic of "allowing both access and operation" will be taken.
1. Having free flow through the "front line". We will set up a "front line" between the Hainan Free Trade Port and other countries and regions outside the customs territory of the People's Republic of China. For the entry (exit) link of the "front line", we will strengthen the supervision of safe entry (exit), and enhance control of public health security at ports, as well as biosafety, food safety, and product quality and safety at national gateways. Under the premise of ensuring the fulfillment of the obligations stipulated in the international treaties concluded or acceded to by China, we will draw up a list of goods and items prohibited or restricted from import and export in the Hainan Free Trade Port, while allowing the free entry and exit of goods and items not on the list, with customs supervision in accordance with the law. We will formulate a catalog of commodities subjected to import duties at the Hainan Free Trade Port, and exempt goods outside of the catalog from import tariffs when entering the free trade port. Transhipped goods delivered under bills of lading will be free from tax and inspection, while goods and items departing from the Hainan Free Trade Port will be administered as for exports. We will implement convenient and efficient customs supervision and build a high-standard "single window" for international trade.
2. Exercising effective control at the "second line". We will establish a "second line" between the Hainan Free Trade Port and other regions within the customs territory of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as "Inland"). When goods are moved inland from the Hainan Free Trade Port, relevant formalities will be in principle handled in accordance with provisions on imports, and tariffs and import-linked taxes will be levied in accordance with regulations. For goods which are produced by encouraged industrial enterprises but do not contain imported materials or parts or contain imported materials or parts whose added value from processing in the Hainan Free Trade Port exceeds 30% (inclusive), no import tariff will be levied on them when they move inland through the "second line", but import value-added tax and consumption tax will be imposed on them in accordance with regulations. Postal items that move inland from the Hainan Free Trade Port will be supervised in accordance with provisions and taxed in accordance with regulations. Import administration will be streamlined for means of transport departing from the Hainan Free Trade Port to inland. Goods, items and means of transport entering the Hainan Free Trade Port from inland will be subjected to administration in accordance with domestic circulation regulations. No customs declaration formalities will be needed for the transhipment of inland goods to inland via the Hainan Free Trade Port. Instead, they should be loaded and unloaded at operational venues (sites) under customs supervision in the free trade port, stored separately from other goods under customs supervision, and conspicuously marked. Venue-operating enterprises shall, according to the needs of customs supervision, transmit to customs offices information on the entry/exit of goods into/from venues, etc.
3. Implementing free production and operation for enterprises on the island. Customs offices will implement targeted supervision of low intervention and high efficiency over enterprises and institutions in the Hainan Free Trade Port, and realize free production and operation for enterprises in the free trade port. For transit goods that are shipped from abroad but are reloaded, sorted and assembled at the Hainan Free Trade Port and then transported to other countries or regions, the customs formalities will be simplified. No storage period will be set for goods in the Hainan Free Trade Port, and storage locations can be selected freely. For goods with "zero tariff", customs offices shall exempt them from routine supervision.
4.
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