General

On July 27, 2021, the General Administration of Customs issued the "14th Five-Year Plan for Customs Development", clarifying that by 2035, the socialist modern customs will be basically completed.

The "14th Five-Year Plan" of the Customs is quite large, including three major sections and ten parts.

Set up 1 main indicator column and 19 supporting, leading, and key engineering project columns to make up for shortcomings, strengths and weaknesses, a total of 20 columns.

The first column focuses on the main indicators of customs development during the "14th Five-Year Plan", one of which is "By 2025, the number of countries (regions) that are expected to be interconnected with overseas "single windows" will reach 15".

*Expected indicators refer to the development goals expected by the customs

It is understood that in 2020, China has achieved interconnection with the Singapore Single Window. The General Administration of Customs is currently conducting docking cooperation with Malaysia, Macau and other customs, and it is expected that there will be 15 in 2025. Xiao Erjun dared to speculate that the future may also be connected with the Hong Kong Single Window, which will be launched in 2019.

Why did China Customs choose to establish interconnection with Singapore?

The reasons may be as follows:

First, the construction of Singapore's "single window" started early.

Singapore’s Trade Net, which dates back to the 1980s, is the world’s first nationwide electronic trade clearance system, the world’s first single window system, which brings the “single window” model to the world . At the end of 2017, Singapore had built 22 connection points around the world. At that time, the goal was to build 50 connection points by 2018. The construction and docking experience is relatively leading.

Second, China and Singapore have already established the basis for cooperation in related affairs and trade.

In 2008, China and Singapore signed the FTA Free Trade Agreement;

In 2009, the ASEAN FTA Free Trade Agreement including China and Singapore was successfully signed;

On November 1, 2019, the electronic network of the certificate of origin of China and Singapore's goods;

On April 9, 2021, the Ministry of Trade and Industry of Singapore announced that it had completed the approval of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement RCEP and submitted the approval letter to the Secretary-General of ASEAN on the same day. Singapore became the first ASEAN country to complete the official RCEP approval process.

Third, Singapore is one of the countries that early supported and actively participated in China's "One Belt One Road" initiative.

On November 12, 2018, China and Singapore upgraded the signing of a number of cooperation documents in the fields of bilateral free trade agreements, interconnection, finance, technology, environment, culture, customs and so on. This also includes the cooperation of the customs blockchain alliance chain.

The latest development of China-Singapore Single Window Interconnection: On June 18, 2021, the fifth meeting of the China-Singapore Customs "Single Window" Joint Working Group was officially held. The two parties shared the latest construction results of the "Single Window" of the two countries, and affirmed the construction results of three pilot cooperation projects including the exchange of preliminary cargo declaration data, the exchange of shipping container customs logistics information and the construction of the "Single Window" alliance blockchain. They were approved in principle. The "Single Window" consortium chain related to the "Technical Standards", "Technical Plans", "Governance Plans", "Marine Container Clearance Logistics Status Business Plan", etc., and made arrangements for the next expansion of the pilot program.

Conclusion:

At the State Council's regular policy briefing on July 29, 2021, Huang Guansheng, member of the Party Committee of the General Administration of Customs and director of the State Port Administration Office, also mentioned "strengthening China's international trade single window and overseas connectivity."

Tips:

In the future, data exchange and cooperation based on trade facilitation among countries (regions) will become more and more open. China and overseas "single window" interconnection countries (regions) will continue to increase. On the one hand, single window interconnection cooperation will help improve customs clearance efficiency and enhance The credibility of trade data; on the other hand, it is helpful for the customs of both sides to conduct data audits and comparisons during supervision and law enforcement, and accurately crack down on violations of declarations such as under-declared goods.

Remind importing and exporting companies that while interconnection brings convenience, it is also a double-edged sword. Enterprises and relevant personnel should pay attention to customs and trade compliance in advance, declare strictly according to the requirements, and the items are consistent to avoid possible retrospective violations of customs declarations between the two parties after the "single window" interconnection. And the requirement to keep electronic or paper documents valid for 3 years.