Free Trade Zone News
- New free-trade harbor area to boost trade with ASEAN
Date: 15-Oct-2007 Sources: (Xinhua Online)
THE Chinese Government has approved plans for the country's fourth preferential tax rated harbor area in a major step towards a free trade zone with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
The State Council authorized the Yangpu Bonded Harbor Area in the Yangpu Economic Development Zone, South China's Hainan Province, covering 9.21 square kilometers and to be completed in three stages.
The first phase of construction has already started, said Hainan Vice Governor Jiang Sixian.
Fifty billion yuan (US$6.66 billion) will be spent on construction and the area will host industries with a total output value of 100 billion yuan, generating 12 billion yuan in taxes annually by 2012.
The other three bonded harbor areas are located in Yangshan in Shanghai, Dongjiang in Tianjin Municipality and Dayaowan in Dalian, Liaoning Province.
Yangpu Economic Development Zone is on the 150-square-kilometer Yangpu Peninsula in northwestern Hainan.
Established in 1992, the zone was originally planned as an export-oriented industrial district focusing on advanced technology and the development of the tertiary industry.
The 1997 Asian financial crisis, however, had a negative impact on Yangpu from which it never fully recovered.
To attract overseas investors, the Yangpu Economic Development Zone has been allowed to apply preferential policies.
Li Lanxue, chief of Haikou Customs, said the Yangpu Bonded Harbor Area would offer tax breaks on imports, and rebates on China-made commodities, while trade between companies inside the harbor area would be exempt from value-added and consumption taxes, in addition to preferential policies granted to Yangpu Economic Development Zone.
The establishment of the bonded area was important to regional economic development and energy strategies, said Jiang Sixian. 'This will help to advance economic development of this province and of the Beibu Gulf between Hainan and ASEAN member states.'
The Yangpu bonded harbor area borders the ASEAN trading zone, close to key international shipping routes, and has a deep-water shoreline of more than 50 kilometers where 80 berths accommodating dead-weight-tonnages of up to 300,000 tons could be built, said Jiang.
It will be the closest industrial base to the oil and gas resources in the South China Sea.
China and ASEAN are seeking to establish a free trade area by 2010.
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