China cuts tariffs on 5,375 ASEAN commodities

Chinese Ministry of Commerce announced on August 16 that China has cut or scrapped tariffs on 5,375 commodities from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) since 2005, as an effort to boost bilateral trade.

Wang Xinpei, spokesman with the Ministry of Commerce, released the news on Thursday.

The average tariff has been reduced from 9.9% to 5.8% since both sides signed the Agreement on Trade in Goods in the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area (CAFTA) in July 2005, when China and ASEAN started to remove trade barriers by launching a tariff reduction plan covering 7,000 categories of products.

Under the agreement, all the products will enjoy zero tariff ratings by 2010 when the free trade area is established.

From January to July, Sino-ASEAN trade volume soared 27.5% over the same period last year to US$109.77 billion. China's imports stood at US$58.77 billion, up 22.4%, and exports US$51 billion, up 34%.

Now, China is ASEAN's fourth largest trade partner, and ASEAN, for the first time, became the fourth largest trade partner of China this year.