RCEP is the world's largest free trade agreement, accounting for nearly a third of the planet's population and 30 percent of its gross domestic product. [Photo/IC]
Since the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership or RCEP trade agreement – a massive trade accord involving China and Asian and Pacific rim nations – took effect on Jan 1 this year, the customs office in Zibo city has issued 2,062 RCEP certificates of origin.
Zibo is a prefecture-level city located in East China's Shandong province and the RCEP certificates involved a visa amount of 630 million yuan ($93.56 million) and tax reductions worth 6.3 million yuan, according to Zibo Customs.
RCEP is a giant trading pact between Asia-Pacific countries – including China and many of its neighbors – which is expected to see tariffs either being substantially reduced or going to zero between members.
As RCEP marked the first time for China and Japan to establish a free trade agreement, Japan has become the largest destination country for RCEP visas under the jurisdiction of Zibo. As a result, some 1,435 RCEP certificates were issued for goods worth about 500 million yuan in the first half of the year.
In addition, Japan lowered its import tariffs under RCEP for the second time on April 1 and 2,973 commodity tariff codes are set to be applied to tariff rates under the second year of the RCEP Japan Tariff Commitment schedule. This means Japanese importers can import goods from RCEP member countries at a lower cost, paving the way for a boost to Zibo's foreign trading firms.
Dongyue Group, for example, recently applied for a RCEP certificate of origin for a batch of difluoride monochloroethane exported to Japan. With the certificate, the customs levy of the product in Japan will be reduced from 3.1 percent to 2.5 percent, reducing 35,000 yuan in duties.
Han Jie, head of foreign trade at Dongyue Group, said the chemical products exported to Japan from the company had received a tariff reduction of nearly 500,000 yuan since the implementation of RCEP.
According to Zibo Customs, the preferential trade agreements with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand have been implemented simultaneously with the introduction of RCEP. Companies can now make comprehensive analyses of preferential trade agreements and maximize the outcomes.
Zibo Customs issues a total of 2,062 RCEP certificates of origin in the first half of 2022. [Photo/zbnews.net]
