□ Article / Journalist Zeng Rui Tr. by He Jing

Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone Got off to a Rather Good Start The First Eight Months Witnessed 451 Projects and a Total of 224 Billion

□ Article / Journalist Zeng Rui Tr. by He Jing

At September 24, during the 12th Annual Meeting of the Chongqing Mayor’s International Economic Advisory Council Press Conference, Xiong Xue, Director of the Chongqing Municipal Commission of Commerce & Municipal Bureau of Free Trade,announced that within the first 8 months of this year, Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone has seen 8608 new enterprises being set up, 451 new projects settled and a total of 224 billion yuan put.Right at the same day, the Chongqing Municipal Commission of Commerce, joining with the Municipal Bureau of Free Trade, held an information exchange meeting, giving a concentrated overview of the situation of the Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone since listed on April 1. Responding to the call of the national and Chongqing reform and development, Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone has rendered an even more robust momentum since the listing.

451 Projects Signed with an Investment of 224 Billion Yuan,Just Within the First 8 Months

Within the first eight months of this year, 8608 new enterprises have emerged in Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone, accounting for 10.2% of the city total; 451 projects have been established with an amount of 224 billion yuan put. Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone has presented a positive and vigorous momentum in the projects soliciting & signing and foreign investment attraction.

In addition, according to the brie fi ng at the information exchange meeting from Liao Hongjun, the Deputy Director of Chongqing Municipal Commission of Commerce, Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone is tapping great potential of mechanism innovation and favorable basic conditions per se, to accelerate the development of modern service industry, advanced manufacturing and strategic emerging industries, promoting high-end industrial agglomeration and facilitating regional industrial transformation and upgrading.The FTA Offices at both the municipal and district levels should reinforce their functionality of investment attraction, and explore the implementation of market-oriented operation with an open thinking path, in ways like joint investment attraction (hereafter as IA), professional IA, focused IA, collaborative IA, etc., actively putting more emphasis on major projects like the aircraft finance leasing, aviation titanium alloy & super alloy, transport aviation power systems, bonded transactions of the import and export of pharmaceutical devices, etc. “Hopefully, more substantial results can come to fruition in terms of projects signing.”

141 Innovative Initiatives Hammered Out and 8 Typical Cases Introduced

In his speech, Director Xiong Xue also pointed out that there are 49 projects have come to a full-fledged completion, out of the first two batches of 51 reform pilot projects in Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone, within its reach for replicating and promoting its own experiences gathered in the process. “Single Window for enterprises”, “Single Window for International Trade” and the other infrastructure initiatives are stepping up to ensure the on-line implementation within this year. According to Director Xiong Xue,Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone has launched 141 innovative initiatives, and submitted to the Office of Joint Conference of the State Council 8 typical cases that are rich of pilot & reform test-beds’ experiences and can be promoted in a reproducible way, covering a broad range of aspects, i.e. the innovative implementation of new supervision model of high efficiency and great convenience—“Four Auto-operations & One Simplification”(including auto-filing, auto-assurance for write-off period, autoreport for veri fi cation, auto-payment for overdue tax or tax evaded,simplification of the verification procedures), the exemption from mandatory products certification for those inbound & outbound R&D products having been checked for many times (namely, the exemption from 3C certi fi cation), pilot integrated market supervision platform to strengthen the interim and ex-post supervision, the innovative building up of the China-Central Europe (Chongqing)Railway Express and the Southern International Logistics Channel of China-Singapore (Chongqing) Demonstration Initiative on Strategic Connectivity, updating rail transport trade settlement method of the China-Central Europe (Chongqing) Railway Express,exploration in the implementation of a new mode of supervision rendering “air clearance” for large imports of food, ten initiatives for speeding up innovation and implementation of tax services, and the establishment of regional identi fi cation system to create a free business environment, to cite but a few.

Reporters noted that Chongqing had taken the lead in setting up the supervision model of application for exempting from mandatory products certi fi cation for those inbound & outbound R&D products having been checked for many times (namely, the exemption from 3C certification), actively propelling the synergy between China Railway Express and the cross-border e-commerce, prodding railway intermodal transport trade settlement by a letter of credit.The above innovative initiatives, of distinctive originality, take lead in each industry, and enjoy great prevalence among the enterprises who relate to it. As such, the initiatives are most likely to be promoted across the country in a reproducible way as a reform test-bed from Chongqing pilot Free Trade Zone.

Strengthen Open Platform Collaboration and Foreign Exchange and Cooperation

Multiple inland open platforms synchronously are a distinctive feature of Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone, having earned great importance since the listing of it, which has promulgated “the Municipal Collaborative Development Program for Open Platforms”.In combination with 14 open platform resources: Liangjiang New District, Customs Special Supervision Area, National Economic Development District, High-tech Zone, etc., it has boosted the synergistic development and rendered superposing policy effects.The release of “China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone and China-Singapore (Chongqing) Demonstration Initiative on Strategic Connectivity Integration Action Plan” has stated items concerning preferential policy sharing, exchange views on initiatives, sharing of resources, mutual promotion and coordinated development.

Meanwhile, in constructing the pilot free trade zone, Chongqing keeps in accordance with the requirements of the standard international economic and trade rules and regulations. Keeping up with the Hong Kong free port, Chongqing has making full use of the Mainland and Hong Kong CEPA mechanism, especially the“CEPA Service Trade Agreement” to comprehensively strengthen exchange and cooperation between the two sides in investment,trade, finance, supervision, etc. During the 20th session of the“Chongqing Trade Fair”, a summit forum on the subject of setting standards in line with Hong Kong free port was held. Concurrently,it has maintained a close exchange with Shanghai, Guangdong,Tianjin, Fujian, etc., the two previous casts of free trade test areas,alongside with Sichuan, Hubei, the third cast.

In an interview with reporters, Zhou Hong, deputy of Representative Office in Chongqing of Hong Kong Trade Development Council,said that, an in-depth cooperation with the internal open platform,while strengthening communication with Hong Kong and other places, will enable the construction of Chongqing Free Trade Zone to gear to the international standards better and more rapidly, spurring the construction of the Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone and inland open highlands. Liao Hongjun believes that “consolidating the open platform for collaboration and external exchanges and cooperation is a crucial guarantee for an inspiring start for Chongqing Pilot Free Trade Zone.”

It is also made public that the operation mechanism and management system of the Free Trade Zone has been established and constantly optimized since of fi cially listed on April 1 this year.11 action plans have been issued, encompassing “Regulations of China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone Management Mechanism”, “Work System of China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone Construction Supervision and Inspection”, “Evaluation and Promotion System on Synthesizing its Reform Experiences of China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone Reform”, “Comprehensive Assessment Approach to China (Chongqing) Pilot Free Trade Zone Operation”, rendering certain the normal operation of the municipality’s pilot free trade zone work and its own Municipal Bureau of Free Trade. While maintaining a continuous introduction of innovative measures to improve the policy support, it also upholds the complete implementation of the work methods of “Two Lists”: a “l(fā)ist of policies”, which stipulates the overall program of the reform pilot task, specify policy measures; the other falls to the “l(fā)ist of projects”, which enumerates the corresponding matters and projects for all policy and institutional innovation. The “Two lists” match each other perfectly, and would be updated monthly to ensure that the relevant work would be carried out in an all-round and ef fi cient fashion.