Hainan Free Trade Port will be China’s new gateway to the world

The Hainan Free Trade Port should become an important gateway for China’s openness to the outside world, the Xinhua news agency reported, quoting President Xi Jinping.

“The strategic goal of establishing the Hainan Free Trade Port is to make it an important gateway for China’s openness to the outside world in a new era,” the Chinese leader said at a meeting on the construction of the port in the city of Sanya in southern Hainan.

According to him, it is necessary to steadily expand institutional openness and continue increasing the level of liberalization and simplification of trade and investment procedures. “We must create a more open mechanism for attracting personnel to provide strong support for the construction of the Free Trade Port.

We should deepen administrative system reform, optimize public services, and strive to create a first-class business environment that is market-oriented, legalized, and internationalized,” Xi Jinping pointed out.

He noted that one of the tasks of building the Hainan Free Trade Port is to create a modern industrial system that leverages the province’s advantages, optimizes and upgrades leading industries, and ensures the integration of scientific, technological, and industrial innovation.

In addition, the Chinese president pointed to the importance of strengthening ties with the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and deepening cooperation with Beijing, Tianjin, and the Hebei Province and Yangtze River Delta regions, as well as integrating into Belt and Road Initiative projects.

The Hainan Free Trade Port Development Program was published on June 1, 2020. The government expects to complete the port’s development by 2025, when a system ensuring free trade and investment should be in place on the island.

The so-called “customs closure” of the free trade port is planned for December 18, which will transform the province into a separate, isolated customs zone with duty-free movement of goods.

By 2035, the free port and its model will be more mature. By then, Hainan plans to ensure freedom of trade and investment, cross-border movement of capital, and the entry and exit of people and freight.