Govt cuts over $386b of taxes and fees

China cut more than 2.5 trillion yuan ($386 billion) of taxes and fees in 2020, achieving the annual target set by the top-level policymakers and easing burdens of market entities after the coronavirus pandemic outbreak, said the nation's taxation authority.

Last year the State Taxation Administration approved 29.2 billion yuan of deferred tax payment for 3.99 million taxpayers, a financial relief measure to mitigate shocks of the COVID-19, the administration reported after its annual meeting held in Beijing on January 8.

The full-year tax income, which excludes the export tax rebate, reached 13.68 trillion yuan, down by 2.6 percent from a year earlier. The income of social security fees was 3.81 trillion yuan and the non-tax income was 631.6 billion yuan, according to data from the STA.

Wang Jun, head of the State Taxation Administration, said at the meeting that in 2021 the STA will further consolidate and expand the effectiveness of tax and fee reduction policy and promote the modern tax system to facilitate high-quality development.

The tax authority will continue to implement existing and new preferential policies for taxes and fees, ensuring that the measures benefit market entities. And the tax policy should help to stabilize economy growth and foster the domestic market-based reforms, said Wang.

The STA also plans to establish a national unified electric bill service platform and enlarge the scale of pilot programs this year. Data analysis on tax bills will help to understand the economic development situation, the statement said.