Laws of the People's Republic of China

The General Administration of Customs, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation

Circular of the General Administration of Customs and the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation on Reiterating the Provisions on the Procedures for Rating the Categorized Management of Enterprises

ShuJianFa [2001] No.325

August 13, 2001

Guangdong Branch, all customs offices directly under the GAC, the commissions (departments or bureaus) of foreign trade and economic cooperation of all provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the Central Government and municipalities separately listed on the State plan:

Ever since October 1999 when the categorized management of enterprises was carried out, relevant measures for management and standards for categorized ratings have been incessantly improved and therefore better suited the development of the current state of affairs. Practical experiences show that the implementation of the categorized management of enterprises has played a positive role in strengthening the supervision of customs offices, encouraging the enterprises' observation of laws and regulations and in establishing a standardized and well-established order of import and export. However, in the categorized management of enterprises in the near past, it has been complained in some places that there exists the problem of easy degradation and difficult promotion and there is the request for loosening the standard for ratings. In order to promote the development of foreign trade and economic cooperation, according to the instructions of the leaders of the State Council and to the decision of the inter-ministerial joint meeting of the MOFTEC, the standard for rating the categorized management of enterprises has been readjusted and jointly publicized by GAC, MOFTEC, and the State Economic and Trade Commission (SETC) (No. 5 of 2001) for implementation as of July 1, 2001. In order to better carry out the spirit of the public notice No. 5 and do a better job in the rating of the categorized management of enterprises, the provisions on the procedures for rating the categorized management of enterprises are reiterated as follows:

According to the provisions of Article 9 of the Circular of the GAC, MOFTEC and SETC Concerning Distributing the Measures of the People's Republic of China for the Customs' Categorized Management of Enterprises (ShuJian [1999] No. 240) and the spirit as reflected in chapter four of the Detailed Rules for the Implementation of the Measures of the People's Republic of China for the Customs' Categorized Management of Enterprises, the customs' categorized management of enterprises requests the support and assistance of the departments like the commissions of foreign trade and economic cooperation, economic and trade commissions, taxation administrations, administrations of foreign exchange, the Bank of China, etc, requests strengthening the connections and cooperation among them, listening to the opinions and suggestions thereof and their concerted effort so as to do a good job in the categorized management of enterprises. In the ratings of the categorized management of enterprises, the customs offices shall invite the above-mentioned departments to attend the ratings meetings so as to supervise over the ratings. Particular attention should be paid to strengthening the assistance and cooperation between the customs offices and the local departments of foreign trade and economic cooperation, the communication of information so as to come to consensus through discussions.

In the process of concrete operations, the customs offices shall take an active and serious attitude so as to formulate systems. The ratings of the categorized management, particularly the degradation of the enterprises of processing trade in Category A, the customs offices shall solicit the opinions of the local departments of foreign trade and economic cooperation which are the department in charge of processing trade and request their participation. The customs offices should treat the opinions of the relevant departments carefully, being responsible for the enterprises and submit the opinions to the committee on categorized management of enterprises for discussion and decision. The local departments of foreign trade and economic cooperation shall strengthen their follow-up administration of the processing trade enterprises, learn in a timely manner the production and management of the enterprises and actively cooperate with the customs in doing a good job in the categorized management of enterprises.