GACC Announcement No.9, 2015 (on Silk Road Economic Belt Customs-Clearance Integration)

The General Administration of Customs (GACC) has decided to launch customs clearance integration among the ten Customs authorities within China's Silk Road Economic Belt involving Qingdao, Jinan, Zhengzhou, Taiyuan, Xi'an, Lanzhou, Yinchuan, Xining, Urumqi, and Lhasa within nine Chinese provinces of Shandong, Henan, Shanxi, Shaanxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Qinghai, Xinjiang, and Tibet.

Relevant matters are hereby announced:

1. As of May 1, 2015, customs-clearance integration will be started among the Customs authorities within the region of Silk Road Economic Belt.

2. The customs-clearance integration herein is applicable to the merchandise import and export by the Economic Belt-based enterprises via the Economic Belt-based Customs ports. The enterprises may freely choose appropriate Customs houses for import/export declaration, taxation, inspection and release formalities.
The enterprises may also freely choose any appropriate clearance models such as port-based clearance, transfer across Customs Districts, and regional customs-clearance integration.

3. Restrictions will be removed for the Economic Belt-based Customs brokers to provide services across Customs Districts, thus permitting them to make declarations to different Customs Districts after being registered with one thereof; the intra-regional branches of outside Customs brokers may directly declare to the intra-regional Customs authorities; the goods, where its licensed port is within the Economic Belt, may be declared to and cleared by any intra-regional Customs authorities, unless otherwise restricted by the state.

4. The intra-regional Customs authorities will reciprocally recognize preliminary merchandise classification, preliminary price approval, preliminary origin identification, and their professional identifications, and administrative licenses as for temporary entry/exit; after system optimization, based on bank guarantee and tax-item summary, one piece of tax guarantee presented by an enterprise will be commonly recognized by all the intra-regional Customs authorities.

5. Current regulations will still be applicable to the clearance integration-related declaration examinations, tax-receipt printing, tax write-off, paperless-to-paper shift, taxation summary, etc.

6. Regarding the goods involved in the integration-based declarations, the enterprises may freely choose whether the inspection is conducted at port-based or local Customs' supervision premises. Where the goods are required to transfer to local supervision premises, the goods and their means of transport shall be compliant with Customs requirements for in-transit supervision.

7. The intra-regional Customs authorities may conduct goods movement formalities based on electronic release information, so as to realize automatic release at checkpoints.

8. The intra-regional Customs authorities will provide public services, such as inquiry for clearance or manifest status and other questions, through "China Customs Online Service" and customs hotline "12360".



General Administration of Customs of China (GACC)
March 30, 2015