Bay Area Tides at the Gateway: Guangzhou Customs Serving High Quality Development with Deep Reform during the 14th Five Year Plan Period
At the busy Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, batches of imported raw materials urgently needed by enterprises are quickly cleared through customs and put into production; In the densely populated Nansha Port, domestic cars board ships in an orderly manner, setting sail for the global market; At Guangzhou International Port, an important railway hub in southern China, the China Europe freight trains loaded with "Made in the Greater Bay Area" goods embark on a thousand mile journey to Europe... At the beginning of 2026, on the fertile land of the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area, the wave of reform and innovation is surging, and the vitality of economic and trade development is surging.
Five years of hard work and progress, five years of spring blossoms and autumn fruits.
A series of data witnessed the five-year commitment of Guangzhou Customs: during the 14th Five Year Plan period, the foreign trade of Guangzhou Customs District steadily developed, with a cumulative import and export volume of 9.3 trillion yuan. Among them, the total import and export volume of Guangzhou City exceeded one trillion yuan for five consecutive years, and by 2025, it will reach a new historical high of 1.2 trillion yuan. Over the past five years, Guangzhou Customs has formulated 202 measures to support the construction of the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area, deeply implemented the Overall Plan of Guangzhou Nansha to Deepen the World oriented Comprehensive Cooperation between Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao (hereinafter referred to as the Nansha Plan), issued two rounds of 102 measures to support the development of Nansha, and launched 16 key measures to jointly build the "the Belt and Road" with high-quality services; For seven consecutive years, we have launched a special campaign to facilitate cross-border trade, introducing 201 service measures to help Guangzhou rank first in the "International Trade" indicator of Guangdong Province's business environment evaluation for many years.
Intelligent supervision improves quality and efficiency, and customs clearance convenience is further upgraded
The import of fresh products such as cherries requires high logistics storage and customs clearance efficiency. After the application of the new "smart certification" model by customs, customs clearance has become more efficient. Looking back at the changes in customs clearance of fresh products during the 14th Five Year Plan period, Liu Juan, the Customs Director of Shenzhen Ouheng Import and Export Co., Ltd., has deep feelings. Coincidentally, Ye Shu, the general manager of Guizhou Lugangtong Logistics Co., Ltd., also shares the same feeling: "In the past, whether it was customs transfer or integrated declaration, import and export goods had to go through customs clearance procedures with two customs. After the implementation of the 'One Port Pass' model, goods exported from Nansha can complete customs clearance at Guiyang International Land Port, and can be directly loaded onto ships for sea after being transported by railway to Nansha Port, reducing the overall logistics time by 3 to 5 days
The Pearl River Delta has a huge foreign trade volume, expanding international logistics channels and improving customs clearance efficiency play an important role in ensuring the safe and stable operation of the industrial and supply chains, promoting cost reduction and efficiency improvement, and enhancing the quality of industrial development. With the continuous growth of China's foreign trade scale, the problems of heavy on-site document review tasks and long on-site inspection time at ports under the traditional customs supervision mode have become increasingly prominent.
Facing pain points and difficulties, during the 14th Five Year Plan period, Guangzhou Customs earnestly practiced the important concept of "smart customs, smart borders, and smart connectivity", continued to promote the construction of smart customs and the "smart customs power" action, and leveraged the level of customs clearance facilitation through smart supervision. The new model of "smart certification", which is the first of its kind in China, realizes intelligent recognition and comparison of customs declaration forms and accompanying documents involved in health quarantine, animal and plant quarantine, food safety, commodity inspection and other fields, with an effective recognition rate of over 95%. While being promoted and applied by customs nationwide, it has been released by the World Customs Organization as an example of artificial intelligence application on the global "Smart Customs" online cooperation platform; Support Nansha in building an international distribution center and bulk commodity storage and transportation base, assist in the construction of a "super gas station" in the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area, and promote the implementation of innovative measures such as "port warehouse relocation"; Building a new paradigm of smart airport at Guangzhou Baiyun Airport Port, leveraging the geographical advantages of Pazhou Hong Kong Macau Passenger Transport Port to empower high-quality development of exhibitions such as Canton Fair, and relying on Foshan International Land Port to promote regional open economy to a higher level; Projects such as the "One Hong Kong Connect" and the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area Research and Evaluation Base for Technical Trade Measures have made multidimensional efforts, forming a batch of replicable and promotable institutional innovation experiences.
The data intuitively presents the effectiveness of the reform. During the 14th Five Year Plan period, the "One Port Connect" regulatory model promoted efficient connectivity between Nansha Port and 25 branch ports inside and outside Guangdong Province, achieving "one declaration, one inspection, and one release" for import and export goods. By 2025, Guangzhou Port will achieve a cargo throughput of nearly 700 million tons and a container throughput of over 28 million TEUs, with foreign trade containers accounting for over 50%. By 2025, Guangzhou Customs will supervise over 18.6 million inbound and outbound personnel through the Guangzhou Baiyun Airport port, a year-on-year increase of approximately 19%; There were 122000 inbound and outbound flights in Banda, a year-on-year increase of about 13%; The import and export freight volume exceeded 1.53 million tons, a year-on-year increase of 8.3%, ranking among the top airports and ports in China.
Reform and innovation enhance vitality, institutional opening explores new paths
Previously, domestic new energy vehicles exported to Hong Kong had to wait for about three weeks before obtaining registration qualifications, resulting in high warehousing costs. Under the 'Guangzhou Hong Kong Automobile Export Express' model, vehicles could apply for approval in advance before arriving in Hong Kong, and then be transported out of the country after the Hong Kong side completed the qualification review, greatly reducing operating costs. "Lu Tao, the general manager of Nansha Automobile Terminal Co., Ltd., expressed his feelings and expressed the dividends brought by the integration mechanism of the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area rules.
During the 14th Five Year Plan period, Guangzhou Customs focused on institutional opening-up as the core, focusing on key tasks such as high-level opening up to the outside world, improving the quality and efficiency of foreign trade, and optimizing the business environment at ports. It deeply integrated into the construction of the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area, and made multidimensional efforts in terms of rule linkage, mechanism docking, regulatory innovation, platform empowerment, etc., promoting the implementation and effectiveness of the Nansha Plan and continuously releasing the dividends of reform.
In order to accelerate the integration of rules and mechanisms in the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area, Guangzhou Customs and Hong Kong Customs have strengthened cooperation and cooperation, and innovatively launched the "Guangzhou Hong Kong Automobile Export Express" cooperation model. Cars exported from mainland China to Hong Kong can be temporarily stored in the export supervision warehouse after completing customs clearance at Nansha Port, and can leave the country after the Hong Kong side completes qualification approval; Take the lead in carrying out cooperation on the safety supervision of raw milk supplied from mainland China to Hong Kong nationwide, and promote the Hong Kong Food and Environmental Hygiene Department to accept the results of mainland customs supervision and provide customs clearance convenience; Innovate the cross-border supervision model for horses between Guangdong and Hong Kong, establish a biosafety channel, implement a unified horse disease monitoring plan and mutual recognition mechanism for results, and pioneer the "horse face intelligent recognition" system to achieve efficient, convenient, safe customs clearance and precise supervision of horses.
Nansha Pilot Free Trade Zone is the largest area in Guangdong Pilot Free Trade Zone, gathering cross-border e-commerce, food and wine distribution businesses. Guangzhou Customs has launched a total of 62 reform measures, including the "Cross border E-commerce Retail Import Return Center Warehouse", to build a dual drive model of "institutional innovation+technological empowerment". The "one-stop" regulatory service model for cross-border e-commerce export returns has been selected as the fifth batch of "best practice cases" in the National Pilot Free Trade Zone, and is the only selected case in the Guangdong Pilot Free Trade Zone.
The dividends of reform have been released in multiple ways, and the institutional opening-up has achieved significant results. At present, 15 independent innovation measures of Guangzhou Customs in the pilot free trade zone have been approved and filed by the General Administration of Customs, ranking among the top in the country's customs. The cross-border trade facilitation level of Nansha Pilot Free Trade Zone ranks among the top in the country. There are also highlights in the field of connecting rules and mechanisms. The clearance time for raw milk supply to Hong Kong has been reduced from 72 hours to within 6 hours, and the frequency of horse racing transportation between Guangdong and Hong Kong has increased from "one in and one out" per week to "three in and three out". In 2025, Guangzhou Customs will quarantine and supervise a total of 9878 cross-border horse racing trips, a year-on-year increase of over 20%.
Cultivating business models to increase potential, accelerating the accumulation of foreign trade momentum
The 'dual front-end' cargo terminal will advance civil aviation security checks and customs inspections, extending airport cargo port services to the comprehensive bonded zone. Now, our cross-border e-commerce export goods can be 'one-stop' cleared, received, inspected, and assembled in the Guangzhou Baiyun Airport Comprehensive Bonded Zone (South Zone), and then directly transported to the airport for loading and export, improving logistics efficiency by about 50%. When it comes to the reform and innovation in the field of cross-border e-commerce, Huang Yongqiang, Chairman of Guangdong Jinyangcheng Supply Chain Technology Co., Ltd., speaks highly of the convenience brought by the 'dual front-end' cargo terminal.
During the 14th Five Year Plan period, new formats such as exhibition economy, cross-border e-commerce, and market procurement have rapidly emerged. In order to promote the high-quality development of the exhibition economy such as the Canton Fair, Guangzhou Customs has conducted in-depth research on industry demand, followed development trends, further clarified and refined service measures, promoted innovation in regulatory service models such as "smart exhibitions", and tailored support measures for each session of the Canton Fair, including setting up convenient customs clearance channels at the port site, arranging customs business expert service teams and public lawyers to provide professional consulting services in the exhibition hall, conducting resident supervision and supporting exhibitors to avoid submitting exhibition tax guarantees, effectively reducing the pressure of exhibition costs.
In terms of cultivating new formats such as cross-border e-commerce and market procurement, Guangzhou Customs has made precise efforts to promote a series of facilitation policies such as "cross-border e-commerce retail export cross customs return" and "cross-border e-commerce retail import tax electronic payment", and support the development of multimodal transport models such as "cross-border e-commerce+sea freight" and "cross-border e-commerce+China Europe freight trains"; Optimize and improve the pilot work plan for the export of pre packaged food and cosmetics through market procurement and trade methods, promote the smooth implementation of the first pilot in South China in Guangzhou, and promote the "market procurement+one port connection" customs clearance mode, integrate port clearance resources, and reduce the clearance time of goods by nearly half.
The new business model has become a driving force for promoting foreign trade growth. In 2025, the cross-border e-commerce exports of Guangzhou Customs District will maintain rapid growth, with an export value of 193.61 billion yuan through the customs cross-border e-commerce management platform, an increase of 1.7 times compared to 2020; The customs district exported 11.28 billion yuan through market procurement trade, a year-on-year increase of 37.5%.
Standing at the new starting point of the "15th Five Year Plan", Guangzhou Customs will continue to deeply study and implement the spirit of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, under the leadership of the Party Committee of the General Administration of Customs, anchor the primary task of high-quality development, closely follow the major tasks of the construction of the Guangdong Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area, high-quality joint construction of the "the Belt and Road", and carry out its duties and missions with the goal of "better supervision, higher safety, greater convenience, and stricter crackdown on smuggling", so as to promote the implementation of all work and take the lead.