The bonded system refers to the customs supervision system in which the goods, approved by the customs to temporarily postpone the formalities such as duty paying on entering the territory, are re-carried out of the territory after being stored, processed and assembled under the supervision of the customs. In other words, bonded system is a job system of the customs supervision over the bonded goods during the whole process of entering the territory, being stored, being processed, being assembled and leaving the territory.
 

The current customs bonded system of our country has emerged and developed since the reform and opening-up.

Customs bonded system had emerged and existed for a time in our country before liberation. Since the founding of New China, under the existence of private merchants, some forms of the old bonded system have remained in the customs management of New China, e.g., the bonded warehouse system. However, owing to the economic blockage from the western countries and China's tight policy on foreign trade for quite a long time, bonded supervision and control had almost discontinued and the old forms of bonded system had gradually disappeared. Since China's reform and opening-up, the rapid economic development, especially in foreign trade, has greatly promoted the bonded business and pushed forward the customs supervision and control over bonded goods, and also sped up the birth and growth of a totally new bonded system that fit in with the economic development.

Interim Measures of the Customs of the People's Republic of China on Supervision and Control of Bonded Goods and Bonded Warehouses, enacted by the Customs General Administration in 1981, is the first regulation dealing with the customs bonded supervision and control system formulated by China customs. It, for the first time, gave a sketchy outline of the form of the bonded system, “bonded storage”, and laid down the specific measures of the supervision over the bonded warehouse and bonded goods.
 

Detailed Rules for the Implementation of Customs Supervision and Control and Taxation on Import and Export Goods by Enterprises Doing Processing, Assembling and Small & Medium-Scaled Compensation Trade, released by the Customs General Administration in Oct. 1982, started to bring the “bonded processing” within the category of bonded system.
 

Customs Law of the People's Republic of China, enacted in 1987, granted the customs the rights of bond authorization in legal form and enlarged the scope of the authorized bonded goods, and finalized the form of the bonded system, “bonded processing”, and stated explicitly that bonded goods belong to the category of customs supervision.
 

Customs Regulations of the People's Republic of China Concerning Control over the Goods, Means of Transport and Personal Articles Entering or Leaving the Shanghai Waigaoqiao Free Trade Zone  enacted by the Customs General Administration in Sep. 1990, set out to establish the new bonded supervision and control system of “bonded area”.
 

Customs Law of the People's Republic of China revised in 2001, supplemented with the articles of customs supervision and control over the processing trade, grants the customs the legal rights of authorization of unit consumption in the processing trade and lays down legal regulations on processing trade, such as be bonded, refund after collection and bonded materials and parts for domestic sales verifying and canceling the amounts by customs, which greatly enriched the content of the bonded system.

During this period, bonded business has been growing in an unprecedented speed. The supervision and control over bonded goods by the customs has quickly formed a complete set of system.
 

In the process of the formation of this system, the appropriate authorities, especially the Customs General Administration, has, in accordance with the relevant national laws, regulations and policies, stipulated and issued a large number of files, which further standardized the scope, methods, procedures, detailed rules, criteria of the bonded supervision and control and put the bonded supervision and control of the customs nationwide on a having-laws-to-go-by and standardized track. The work requirements of customs bonded supervision and control included in the relevant national laws, regulations, policies and standardization documents constitute the basic element of bonded system.
 

At present, the bonded system has become a main supervision and control system of China Customs.