Bond zones as one of the factors of the development of electronic commerce in the Russian Federation and China
The article considers bond zones as one of the relevant and effective tools for the development of Russian-Chinese electronic commerce. A comparative analysis of approaches to the organization of bonded territories in China and Russia is carried out. Based on the assessment of the features of the functioning of bonded zones, the key advantages and potential of their application for increasing international online trade have been identified. It is concluded that, being a necessary and effective tool for trade and economic cooperation with China, the development of bonded warehouses on the territory of the Russian Federation requires a careful assessment of possible risks for the state and domestic producers.
Keywords: electronic commerce, bonded zone, customs payments, customs clearance, bonded warehouse.
In modern conditions of the global spread of Internet technologies, the traditional form of trade is largely being replaced by electronic or online trade. One of the countries actively supporting the development of remote commodity and money exchange, including international, is China. According to a study by the Asia Pacific digital agency, as of the end of 2022, China's e-commerce volume was three times higher than that of the United States and 15 times higher than that of Germany <1>.
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<1> Marketing research: Russia's place in Chinese e-commerce 2022. p. 3.
The political and economic restrictions imposed on Russia since 2014 have led to the formation and strengthening of the country's foreign trade relations with China. Today, we can state a significant reorientation of Russia's commodity flow from the West to the East. Despite the termination of the official publication of statistical data on the volume and geographical structure of foreign trade of the Russian Federation since January 2022, the available analytical information and expert assessments confirm the relevance for the beginning of 2023. a more than 26% decrease in trade turnover with Western countries that conduct or support foreign trade policies unfriendly to Russia <2>. At the same time, the growth of Russian-Chinese trade turnover reached record levels and amounted to 29.3% by the end of 2022 and 38.7% in January -March 2023. <3>
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<2> Tectonic shift: how Russia's foreign trade has changed in 2022.
<3> The trade turnover between Russia and China in January - March increased by 38.7% to $53.84 billion.
The share of cross-border online trade between countries is at least 9.2% for Russia and at least 24.5% for China <4>, which indicates the significant superiority of the eastern partner in the development of the ecosystem of international e-commerce. An additional factor contributing to the development of Russian-Chinese online commerce was the coronavirus pandemic, which caused significant restrictions on the ability of the population to make purchases in the traditional way. The growth in the volume of electronic commerce in the structure of foreign trade turnover of states compared to 2019 amounted to 3-5% <5>.
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<4> Marketing research: Russia's place in Chinese e-commerce 2022. p. 15.
<5> Ibid.
At the same time, the unpreparedness of the logistics system of Russia and China for a sharp increase in mutual trade has provoked a significant increase in the cost and slowdown in the delivery of goods wrapped within the framework of cross-border online trade. This situation dictates the need to optimize the costs associated with the transportation and customs clearance of goods. Bonded warehouses are one of the tools for optimizing logistics costs and business risks.
However, today the active development and use of bonded territories in China coexists with their almost complete absence on the territory of Russia, which acts as a serious deterrent to the development of mutual online trade.
The concept of bonded territories or bonded warehouses is not provided for in Russian legislation. This is due to the lack of such practices in the country. However, a sufficient number of concepts of bonded warehouses (territories) based on foreign law and law enforcement practice are presented in the scientific literature.
Bonded zones, also known as free economic zones (hereinafter referred to as FEZs), are special territories in a country where simplified customs and tax regimes operate to attract and stimulate foreign investment and economic development. The main purpose of the formation of bonded zones within the framework of cross-border e-commerce is to increase trade turnover by reducing the cost of production and assembly operations, improving conditions for exports and attracting foreign investors. Special customs control rules and tax benefits are traditionally established on the territory of bonded zones (or warehouses). The principal difference between bonded zones and customs warehouses is their legal status: if a customs warehouse stores goods in respect of which customs declaration has been made and customs payments have been made, then a bonded warehouse under customs control contains goods released before filing a customs declaration <6>.
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<6> Free shipping zone: an experiment with bonded warehouses will be conducted in the Russian Federation - comment of the Federal Customs Service of Russia // Izvestia.
Bonded zones are usually formed in the territories of ports or airports where optimization of international trade and logistics (including electronic) is required, as well as in territories specially designated for industrial development and investment attraction.
In general, cross-border electronic commerce using bonded warehouses (zones, territories) can be schematically represented as follows:
At the same time, the specifics of the location, legal status, applied simplifications and functionality of bonded zones are determined by each specific State. Within the framework of this study, it is significant to conduct a comparative analysis of the level of development and functioning of bonded zones in China and Russia.
The idea of creating bond zones in China arose in the late 1970s, when the country embarked on the path of economic reforms and discoveries. The purpose of the innovation was to attract foreign investment, stimulate exports and develop international trade. The first bonded zones in the state were established already in the early 1980s through the launch of pilot projects in Shenzhen, Shanghai, Zhuhai and Shandong. The result of the experiment was the attraction of capital, technology and experience from abroad through the formation of preferential administrative and tax conditions for conducting foreign trade.
In the following years, bond zones in China continued to develop and expand. Thus, in the 1990s, changes were made to the legislation of the People's Republic of China aimed at improving the business environment in bonded zones and attracting more foreign investment, and in 2013 The Shanghai Free Trade Zone was created, which became the largest and most experimental bonded zone in China, combining not only warehouses for storage, packaging and minimal processing of foreign goods for sale on the domestic market, but also industrial warehouse and processing complexes that allow foreign companies to complete a full production and assembly cycle with subsequent production goods to the Chinese market or their export to other countries. In addition, similar conditions (bond zones) were created for Chinese representatives of domestic online commerce, which is the most common form of interaction between seller and consumer in the country <7>.
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<7> Bolgov S.A. Organization of bonded zones: a review of territorial cases / S.A. Bolgov, M.V. Kournikova // Economics and entrepreneurship. 2022. N 9(146). p. 1072.
Thus, over the past decades, bonded zones in the People's Republic of China have been used as a platform for conducting experiments and testing new trade and economic practices: innovations in finance, customs control, and enterprise registration. By 2023, bonded zones in China have become not only an important tool for attracting foreign investment and developing exports, but also a significant platform for modernizing the economy through the possibility of using economic privileges by national marketplaces.
In contrast to the rich experience of the People's Republic of China in the use of bonded zones in Russia, today they exist only as an experimental project. Recognizing the impact of the coronavirus pandemic and the aggravated anti-Russian trade and economic policy on the development of foreign trade and meeting the needs of the Russian market, the Government of the Russian Federation, in cooperation with the Eurasian Economic Commission, has been preparing an initiative for more than two years to launch this experiment and introduce a new section into the Customs Code of the EAEU (hereinafter referred to as the EAEU TC).
Since April 1, 2023, an experiment has been conducted in Russia to perform customs operations by a designated postal operator using the customs procedure of a customs warehouse in respect of goods imported into the Russian Federation for subsequent purchase by individuals within the framework of international electronic commerce and sent in international mail <8>. During the year, temporary rules apply for the placement of designated goods in customs warehouses located in places of international postal exchange and equipped with X-ray equipment that allows for end-to-end inspection of all goods participating in the experiment <9>, while the number of such warehouses is not specified.
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<8> Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation dated November 2, 2022 N 1962 "On conducting an experiment on performing customs operations by a designated postal operator using the customs procedure of a customs warehouse in respect of goods imported into the Russian Federation for subsequent purchase by individuals within the framework of international electronic commerce and sent in international mail".
<9> In the same place. Item 4.
The experiment involves all goods that are the subject of cross-border electronic commerce, except excisable goods and goods that are subject to customs duties, tariff quotas, preferences and special protective measures <10>.
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<10> In the same place. Item 5.
The main features from the point of view of the organization of the work of bonded warehouses in Russia are:
- the possibility of storing goods in a warehouse without paying customs duties and taxes before their actual purchase and release for domestic consumption;
- absence of customs duties for performing customs operations with goods placed (placed) in a warehouse;
- centralization of functions for customs declaration, confirmation of compliance of goods with the requirements of customs legislation, payment of customs duties and taxes and organization of internal delivery of goods to the buyer within the framework of a single electronic commerce operator (Russian Post);
- the possibility of releasing goods before filing a customs declaration;
- the status of MPO (express cargo) for items of cross-border electronic commerce, which determines the presence of a duty-free import threshold (1,000 euros with a tendency to reset in the future);
- simplified re-export of unclaimed goods <11>.
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<11> Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation dated November 2, 2022 N 1962 "On conducting an experiment on performing customs operations by a designated postal operator using the customs procedure of a customs warehouse in respect of goods imported into the Russian Federation for subsequent purchase by individuals within the framework of international electronic commerce and sent in international mail". Paragraphs 7, 11, 14, 18, 22 // In the same place.
Thus, bonded warehouses in Russia are not analogous to Chinese ones in terms of organization and benefits provided. In the Russian Federation, and in the future throughout the territory of the EAEU, items of international electronic commerce deposited with deferred customs clearance are not subject to fees for customs operations, and customs duties and taxes are paid only after the actual payment by the buyer of a particular product. At the same time, the requirements of customs tariff and non-tariff (technical) regulation apply to goods participating in international online trade in full. The threshold for duty-free import of goods increased to 1,000 euros is a temporary measure aimed at leveling the shortage of goods in the Russian domestic market. During its saturation, the amount of the duty-free import threshold will return to its previous value of 200 euros, and in the future it will be reset to zero, which will lead to the need to pay customs duties and VAT for each product wrapped within the framework of cross-border electronic commerce.
Despite the significant lag between Russia and China in the development and functioning of bonded zones, the progress achieved makes it possible to identify potential opportunities for the development of Russian-Chinese electronic commerce.
Firstly, due to the possibility of accelerated delivery of goods to consumers from Russia and the People's Republic of China and the absence of customs payments (in most cases), it becomes possible to rapidly expand sales markets for Russian and Chinese representatives of online commerce, which is an urgent task both from the point of view of increasing exports and from the point of view of satisfying Russian a shortage of products whose official supplies have been stopped due to sanctions (an additional channel for the development of parallel imports).
Secondly, bonded zones are an important tool for the development of electronic commerce in Russia and China from an entrepreneurial point of view, since they guarantee: no need to freeze funds as advance customs payments; simplified re-export procedure for unclaimed (unrealized) goods; the possibility of paying for goods in national currency on the territory of the country - founder of the bonded warehouse (this circumstance is especially important it is important in conditions of violation of established payment chains of international transactions for the Russian Federation).
Thus, in the context of the rapid expansion of trade and economic cooperation between Russia and China, the development of an electronic form of cross-border commerce is becoming particularly relevant. In order to prevent a shortage of sanctioned products on the Russian market, as well as in order to generally increase the volume of online trade between states, the Government of the Russian Federation initiated the development of bonded warehouses in the country as one of the most effective tools for the development of international electronic commerce.
As a result of the analysis of China's significant experience in the field of functioning of bonded warehouses, as well as taking into account the peculiarities of the experiment on their formation in Russia, it can be argued that bonded territories suggest significant potential for increasing mutual electronic commerce by significantly reducing business risks and simultaneously improving the consumer qualities of goods (delivery speed and price). In addition, the presence of bonded territories in the country today determines the growth of transit potential.
However, the active development of the institution in question requires a thorough analysis of economic risks for the state and national producers, and therefore further research on this topic continues to be an urgent theoretical and practical task.
