China's duty-free shop policy will be "upgraded" starting November 1, and even drones will be available for purchase. This is expected to further enhance the appeal of duty-free shops for inbound and outbound travelers’ shopping consumption.
According to Hong Kong Ta Kung Pao, on the 30th, five departments including China’s Ministry of Finance and Ministry of Commerce issued a notice, stating that from November 1 onwards, the duty-free shop policy will be improved to further leverage its role in supporting consumption, guide the return of overseas consumption, attract foreign nationals to shop in China, and promote healthy and orderly development in the retail of duty-free goods.
The notice improved the duty-free shop policy in four aspects: First, optimizing management of domestic product tax refund (exemption) policy, actively supporting the sale of domestic goods at port exit duty-free shops and downtown duty-free shops, encouraging the introduction of more high-quality products with outstanding traditional Chinese cultural characteristics, and increasing the proportion of domestic products sold in duty-free shops.
Second, further expanding the categories sold at duty-free shops by including more easy-to-carry consumer goods such as mobile phones, mini drones, sports goods, health foods, non-prescription drugs, pet foods, and other popular items.
Third, relaxing the approval authority for duty-free shops, delegating the approval of the establishment of port exit duty-free shops, changes of business operators for port exit and entry duty-free shops, optimizing the way to determine the business area of port exit and entry duty-free shops, and supporting local governments to optimize duty-free shop layouts according to local conditions.
Fourth, improving duty-free shop facilitation and regulatory measures, supporting port exit duty-free shops, port entry duty-free shops and downtown duty-free shops to provide online reservation services, and allowing travelers to pick up pre-ordered goods at port entry duty-free shops after reserving them in downtown duty-free shops.
According to reports, Hu Hongyan, postdoctoral researcher at Central University of Finance and Economics, said the new policy for duty-free shops precisely responds to the “15th Five-Year Plan” recommendations: expanding the supply of popular categories such as mobile phones and drones to solve the problem of "few quality goods to choose from"; optimizing tax refund policies for domestic products and introducing specialty items to drive consumption upgrades; and convenient measures such as online reservations and cross-store pickups directly address pain points in the consumer experience—these initiatives are expected to accelerate the return of overseas consumption. In addition, the policy focuses more on building long-term mechanisms; delegating approval authority and optimizing layouts echo the plan's requirements to "improve mechanisms that promote consumption," which can both attract inbound consumption through the “Buy in China” brand and stimulate domestic demand through supply-side upgrades.