On September 26, the executive meeting of the State Council decided on measures to promote the landing of major foreign investment projects, reduce import tariffs on some commodities and accelerate the facilitation of customs clearance so as to promote a higher level of opening to the outside world.  The State Administration of New Zealand held a briefing on optimizing the business environment at ports and promoting cross-border trade facilitation on September 27 to introduce the relevant information on optimizing the business environment at ports and promoting cross-border trade facilitation.

 Recently, the executive meeting of the State Council has determined a number of measures to optimize the business environment at ports and promote cross-border trade facilitation.  The State Administration of New Zealand held a regular briefing on the State Council's policy on September 27. Zhang Guangzhi, member of the party group of the General Administration of Customs and director of the State Port Administration Office, and Bai Shi, deputy director of the State Port Administration Office, introduced the situation.  It is reported that the overall clearance time for imports and exports will be reduced by a third from last year, with imports from 97.39 hours to 65 hours and exports from 12.29 hours to 8.2 hours.  The port governance system and governance capability have been greatly optimized and improved to form a more dynamic, efficient, open and convenient port business environment.  

 " Several measures to optimize the business environment at the port to promote cross-border trade facilitation are summarized as reducing documents, optimizing procedures, improving timeliness and reducing costs.  Zhang Guangzhi said that in terms of documents reduction, the number of regulatory documents to be verified in import and export links will be reduced from 86 to 48 by November 1, and in principle all will be connected to the Internet and checked in customs clearance links.  In terms of excellent procedures, we will deepen the reform of national customs clearance integration and push forward the one-time joint inspection of customs, border inspection and maritime affairs.  In terms of timeliness, the overall clearance time for imports and exports will be reduced by half to 48 hours by the end of 2021 compared with 2017, except that the overall clearance time for imports and exports will be reduced by another third from last year.  The overall clearance time for exports was reduced by half to 6.15 hours.  In terms of cost reduction, the compliance cost of container import and export will be reduced by more than US $ 100 from 2017.  To clean up non-compliant charges, local port charges will be announced by the end of October.

 " Overall customs clearance time and customs clearance time are two concepts.  " Zhang Guangzhi said that the overall customs clearance time refers to the time when goods arrive in Hong Kong and are allowed to leave the whole import and export link, including the time spent on arrival, loading and unloading, stacking, tally, declaration, inspection, release and departure of goods.  This year's " Government Work Report" proposes that the overall clearance time should be reduced by another third within the year.  Last year, China's overall customs clearance time was 97.39 hours, which was reduced to 65 hours at the end of the year according to a 1 / 3 reduction.  To ensure the completion of the compression task, some effective measures should be taken.  For example, increase the proportion of declare in advance before the arrival of imported goods at the port, push forward the reform of tariff guarantee insurance, and carry out " pre - release and post - test" of mineral products such as iron ore.

 Baishi said that building a " single window" for international trade is an important measure to promote trade facilitation and improve the business environment at ports.  In recent years, the General Administration of Customs has worked with 18 departments to promote the construction and promotion of the " single window". Up to now, the " single window" has realized the connection and information sharing with 10 ministries and departments, and has realized 12 major functions, such as cargo declaration, manifest declaration, export tax refund, tax payment, cross-border e-commerce and bonded trade.  Up to now, the main application rate of " single window" has increased from 30 % last year to more than 70 %, with more than 580,000 registered users and a total application volume of more than 120 million tickets, making it the main platform in the field of customs clearance and international trade.