Five Years on, China Speeds its Way to Build Hainan Free Trade Port

The Hainan FTP construction is in full swing as the tropical island province further deepens reform and opening up and makes institutional innovations to align with top international standards. Over the years, more than 180 policies and measures on tariff exemptions and trade and investment facilitation have gone into effect to support the development of the Hainan FTP. Sales of offshore duty-free shops in the province are expected to exceed 80 billion yuan this year after exceeding 60 billion yuan in 2021.

Over the past five years, China has made solid strides in building a high-level free trade port (FTP) in its southern island province of Hainan. On April 13, 2018, China announced a decision to support Hainan in developing the whole island into a pilot free trade zone and gradually exploring and steadily promoting the establishment of a free trade port with Chinese characteristics.

China has called for accelerating the development of Hainan into an FTP with Chinese characteristics and global influence and making Hainan into a paradigm of reform and opening up in the new era.

The Hainan FTP construction is in full swing as the tropical island province further deepens reform and opening up and makes institutional innovations to align with top international standards.

BUSTLING FTP CONSTRUCTION

Hainan is doing preparation tasks and stress tests for independent customs operations and plans to finish building 31 necessary infrastructures by the end of 2023, Liu Xiaoming, acting governor of Hainan, told a press briefing on Wednesday.

According to a master plan on the

Hainan FTP released in 2020 by the central authorities, the Hainan FTP is scheduled to initiate independent customs operations

throughout the whole island by the end of 2025.

As one of the country’s major opening-up measures in the new era, China aims to build the whole of Hainan into a globally influential and high-level FTP by the middle of the century.

Province. Photo: Xinhua/Pu Xiaoxu This aerial photo taken on Oct. 6, 2022 shows a section of the round-the-island tourist highway in Danzhou, south China’s Hainan

China’s Hainan Photo: Xinhua/Pu Xiaoxu This aerial photo taken on Feb. 26, 2023 shows the Yangpu Bonded Port Area in the Yangpu Economic Development Zone, south Province.

Photo: Xinhua/Pu Xiaoxu This aerial photo taken on Nov. 20, 2021 shows the expansion project of Haikou Meilan International Airport in Haikou, south China’s Hainan Province.

Photo: Xinhua/Pu Xiaoxu This aerial photo taken on April 4, 2023 shows the Haikou International Duty-Free Shopping Complex in Haikou, south China’s Hainan Province.