As night falls, the Dongguan–Hong Kong International Airport Center is brightly lit. Container trucks loaded with cross-border e-commerce parcels shuttle back and forth, while customs officers conduct rapid inspections through an X-ray same-screen comparison system. Meanwhile, at the Guangzhou Nansha Comprehensive Bonded Zone, parcels fly off the assembly lines as customs officers work overtime to review documents and ensure rapid clearance of goods. Inside the cross-border e-commerce direct purchase import supervision warehouse at Guangzhou Baiyun Airport Port, five sorting lines operate efficiently, with batches of imported skincare products and apparel inspected and released before being shipped to destinations across the country. Such bustling scenes are a microcosm of the vigorous development of new foreign trade formats in Guangdong. In the first seven months of this year, the comprehensive bonded zones within Guangdong Province recorded 1.05 trillion yuan in imports and exports, a year-on-year increase of 32.3%, breaking the trillion-yuan threshold two months earlier than the previous year. Guangdong's foreign trade also exceeded one trillion yuan in a single month for three consecutive months. Facing a complex international environment, Guangdong's foreign trade has demonstrated strong resilience, using credit empowerment and policy synergy to drive new formats and new models to accelerate.
Turning AEO Credit into Financial Dividends
Credit is the cornerstone of the market economy and a passport for high-level opening-up. Guangdong Customs has deepened the approach of "credit empowerment and policy synergy," helping to cultivate 2,035 Customs Advanced Certified Enterprises (AEO), the highest number in the country. In the first seven months of this year, Customs Advanced Certified Enterprises accounted for 1.11% of foreign trade enterprises but contributed 48.73% of foreign trade volume, with imports and exports growing 25.7%. Credit cultivation relies on "actively knocking on doors." In Jiangmen, customs officers visited chain-leading enterprises in the industrial chain to carry out "cultivation–certification–tracking" chain-style services. Since the beginning of this year, Jiangmen has added 111 certified enterprises, including 14 chain-leading enterprises. Victory Giant Technology (Huizhou) Co., Ltd. is a leading enterprise in the PCB (printed circuit board) industry and also a Customs Advanced Certified Enterprise. Since the beginning of this year, the company's orders have continued to grow and its production lines have continued to expand, increasing demand for imported high-precision testing equipment. Under conventional procedures, equipment inspection involves many steps and takes a long time, and there are risks of damage during transfer and disassembly. How to solve these problems? Victory Giant Technology submitted its request through the China Customs Credit Management Service Platform. "Unexpectedly, the customs coordinator responded to our request in less than 30 minutes," recalled the company's customs affairs manager. Customs enterprise coordinators quickly verified the situation and coordinated with multiple departments including commodity inspection, port supervision, and local customs to conduct research. Referring to facilitation measures for the clearance of complete sets of imported equipment, they prescribed a "one enterprise, one policy" solution for Victory Giant Technology: changing sample testing to on-site inspection and comprehensive supervision. After the equipment was successfully put into use, customs also made advance arrangements for the company's subsequent import of approximately 5,000 sets of equipment, tailoring 14 facilitation measures. The value of credit also lies in converting it into tangible financial dividends. The Guangdong Sub-Administration of the General Administration of Customs, together with customs authorities within the province, has fully connected with Agricultural Banks at all levels, implementing 13 joint customs-bank incentive measures, opening up the conversion channel between customs credit and financial services, and truly converting high-quality customs credit into all-dimensional financial dividends for foreign trade enterprises in financing, settlement, risk hedging, and fee rates, comprehensively escorting American Eagle Outfitters (AEO) enterprises to stabilize foreign trade and expand globally.
Cross-Border E-Commerce Achieving "Greater Bay Area Speed"
How long does it take at minimum for a parcel to go from manufacturing to reaching an overseas consumer? Guangdong is constantly refreshing the answer. As the fastest-growing and most promising new foreign trade format, cross-border e-commerce has become a surging driving force for Guangdong's foreign trade. According to statistics from Huangpu Customs, from January to July this year, the value of cross-border e-commerce imports and exports supervised by Huangpu Customs increased by 20.9% year-on-year, with the efficiency of multiple cross-border logistics channels including air, road, and rail continuing to be released, demonstrating strong foreign trade resilience and "Greater Bay Area speed." The air channel prioritizes speed. At the Dongguan–Hong Kong International Airport Center, Shatian Customs under Huangpu Customs integrates supervision into the core links of aviation logistics, with integrated operations of customs supervision, aviation security inspection, and cargo tallying and palletizing. X-ray same-screen comparison technology compresses the inspection of a single parcel to under 20 seconds. Under the alignment of rules between Dongguan and Hong Kong, "one declaration, one security check, one-stop loading" has been successfully implemented, saving enterprises approximately 30% in comprehensive logistics costs. As the country's first cross-border sea-air intermodal transport project directly connected to the airside of an airport, the Dongguan–Hong Kong International Airport Center has handled over 80 billion yuan in cargo value in three years of operation, with an average annual growth of 217%. It has attracted 32 Hong Kong airlines and 146 air freight forwarders to settle in, serving more than 2,800 import and export enterprises trading globally. From January to August this year, the airport center's export cargo value reached 30.709 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 38.84%, with cross-border e-commerce parcels accounting for nearly 50% of cargo weight. The land channel is equally efficient. On January 29 this year, the Dongguan Machong Cross-Border E-Commerce Supervision Center was put into operation. Xinsha Customs under Huangpu Customs opened up the "Machong–Shenzhen Bay–Hong Kong International Airport" cross-border channel, relying on "land-air intermodal transit plus secure smart locks" intelligent supervision, with vehicle sealing completed within 20 seconds and each transit saving one hour. The supervision center is closely linked with leading warehousing projects such as Pinduoduo's supply chain base and Cainiao's South China Export Preferred Warehouse, enabling e-commerce goods to be "stored locally and cleared nearby." As of the end of August, this channel had handled more than 9,800 cross-border vehicle trips between Guangdong and Hong Kong, with a cumulative inspection and release of "9610" cross-border e-commerce export parcels valued at approximately 10.2 billion yuan.
"Bonded Plus" Extending Industrial Chain Value
Comprehensive bonded zones are customs special supervision areas with the highest level of openness, the most preferential policies, and the most complete functions. Guangdong Customs takes the opportunity of expanding and upgrading comprehensive bonded zones to promote the innovative development of "Bonded Plus" new formats, elevating industrial chains and value chains to higher ends. Bonded maintenance services were the first to break through, opening up the entire chain of "maintenance–processing–export." On June 29, at the aircraft component maintenance base of Guangzhou Aircraft Maintenance Engineering Co., Ltd., three aircraft engine intake ducts with a total cargo value of over 8 million yuan, after on-site supervision by customs officers from Guangzhou Baiyun Airport Customs confirmed compliance of warehousing and transfer routes, quickly entered maintenance workstations. "In the past, maintenance materials required tax payment guarantees. Now, using the account book management model directly eliminates this pressure, and the upper limit of business capacity has also been opened up," said Gan Yongjun, deputy general manager of Guangzhou Aircraft Maintenance Engineering Co., Ltd. He noted that after the project is fully operational, it is expected to release 3 billion yuan in guarantee quotas annually and reduce declaration documents by over 75%, significantly improving the turnover efficiency of single-item maintenance. While the maintenance chain is opened up, financial leasing is also taking off lightly. Based on the framework of the cross-customs-district entrusted supervision system, customs has built a cross-customs-district coordinated supervision channel, effectively reducing the transfer links for aircraft imports and greatly shortening delivery cycles. In the first seven months of this year, the comprehensive bonded zones of Shenzhen Qianhai, Guangzhou Nansha, and Baiyun Airport completed a total of 38 aircraft bonded leasing cross-customs-district entrusted supervision transactions, with cargo value exceeding 15 billion yuan. Aircraft leasing reduces costs and increases efficiency, while bonded logistics allows global goods to "group orders" and depart from comprehensive bonded zones. Customs supports the development of international transit consolidation business within the zones, where international goods are distributed and consolidated before being directly shipped globally via "sea, land, air, and rail" multimodal transport. In the first seven months of this year, bonded logistics imports and exports in the province's comprehensive bonded zones reached 910.29 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 39.6%.
Departure Tax Refunds Unleashing Consumer Vitality
New formats are not only appearing on the production side but are also active on the consumption side. In the first seven months of this year, customs authorities within Guangdong Province verified a total of 186,000 departure tax refund applications, with the amount of verified application forms reaching 1.69 billion yuan, representing year-on-year increases of 6.4 times and 1.2 times, respectively. Electronic products and clothing have become the "favorites" for travelers applying for departure tax refunds. With a tap of a finger, the tax refund process has quietly "slimmed down." Relying on digital reform, the Guangzhou port has achieved full paperless customs verification for departure tax refunds. Customs officers scan the traveler's exclusive service code to retrieve electronic tax refund forms and electronic invoices online, completing the review online. Paper document circulation and stamping steps are all eliminated, greatly reducing traveler waiting time. Traveler Bekpateva Kalrygash from Kazakhstan has deep feelings about this. In the past, she always had to carefully keep paper tax refund vouchers when traveling. Now, she scans a code at tax refund stores to generate an electronic tax refund form, and upon departure, she only needs the "departure tax refund service code" on her phone to complete customs verification. "The entire process is handled online, which is both convenient and efficient," she praised. Guangzhou's "smooth" experience is not an isolated case. Shenzhen Customs has built a departure tax refund port layout covering sea, land, and air, with six departure tax refund ports ranking among the highest in the country. Relying on the new paperless policy to shorten clearance time, small-amount spot checks can be completed in as fast as 20 seconds. Gongbei Customs is accelerating the layout of port tax refund service points. Currently, five service points in the customs district cover four ports, allowing travelers to handle business nearby and with fewer trips. According to statistics, in July this year, Guangdong Province added three departure tax refund ports and four verification service points, bringing the province's total to 13 ports that can provide departure tax refund verification services. Customs handled a total of 27,000 departure tax refund verification transactions, with verified application form amounts reaching 260 million yuan, representing month-on-month increases of 4.2% and 1.8% compared to June. From credit empowerment to clearance acceleration, from "Bonded Plus" chain extension to departure tax refund expansion, Guangdong Customs is activating open momentum through institutional innovation, helping Guangdong build a strong trade province and promote high-level opening-up.
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