In recent years, to quickly merge itself with the world economic tide, China has made active efforts to reduce customs duties. On April 1, 1996 the Chinese government reduced the rate of import duties of 4,971 tax items, thus making the tariff rate decrease from 35 percent to 23 percent on average. On October 1, 1997, the Chinese government reduced the import duty rate of commodities of 4,874 tax numbers, resulting in the reduction of the customs duties from 23 percent to 17 percent on average. Starting from January 1, 2001 the Chinese government decided to reduce the customs duties on its own again, and the overall level of the customs duty decreased to 15.3 percent. The year 2002 was the first year after China's accession to the WTO. According to statistics, China's import customs duties decreased from 43.2 percent of 1992 to 12 percent in 2002, thus thoroughly changing the traditional high customs-duty policy. This decrease of customs duty involved a total of 4,315 tax items, making up 59 percent of China's total tax items.

The Chinese government will continue to carry out its promise of reducing the customs duty step by step. By 2005, China's customs duty rate is expected to have dropped to below the average level of developing countries, and its average import duty rate of industrial products to about 10 percent.