Efficient customs clearance boosts food supplies

Officials at Gongbei Customs in Zhuhai inspect grocery supplies headed for Macao. "We supply Macao with over 10 batches of fresh seafood products every day, thanks to efficient customs clearance procedures," said Zhou Jinhong, a manager in charge of the processing and distribution center of the company. Considering fresh seafood products supplied to Macao, with multiple batches, diverse varieties and high customs clearance requirements, Gongbei Customs has strengthened cooperation with its Macao counterparts to promote rule alignment and mechanism integration. The new model reduced pre-export declaration batches by 99 percent for enterprises, helping greatly improve customs inspection efficiency and benefiting over 5,000 tons of fresh seafood products supplied to Macao. "With the new customs models, we have exported over 1,100 tons of fresh aquatic products to Macao this year, marking an 11 percent increase compared to the same period last year," said Ding Hongliang, a production manager with Zhongshan Foodstuffs & Aquatic Import & Export Group Co. At the beginning of Macao's return to the motherland, the types of daily necessities supplied to the special administrative region from Zhuhai were limited, mostly mainstream varieties, according to Pan Wenbo, an officer at Xiangzhou Customs, under the jurisdiction of Gongbei Customs.