Guangzhou Practice and Research Center for Optimizing Tax Services and Business Environment, the first of its kind in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA), was recently unveiled at the Guangzhou Tax Service, State Taxation Administration. By benchmarking against the World Bank’s business environment assessment system, this center will give full play to the tax authority’s functions and expertise on the business environment. Gradually, it will emerge as a hub for research, practice, and training for optimizing tax services and business environment that is based in the GBA and features a global perspective and strong links with Hong Kong and Macao. The center will serve as a strong booster for Guangzhou in building an modern and international business environment.

According to an official of Guangzhou Tax Service, by pooling the resources from the taxation system, government departments, and social science system, the center will conduct research on the overall situations, strategic plans, forward-looking ideas, long-term practices, hot topics, and tough issues in taxation. It will carry out exchanges and cooperation with domestic research institutions, and engage in cutting-edge theoretical research on best practices at home and abroad. Notably, in-depth investigation and research will be conducted on the tax-related indicators in the business environment assessment, including the quality of regulations on taxation, services provided by tax administrations, and efficiency of tax systems in practice in China. Its goal is to provide policy and theoretical support and feasibility proof for implementing innovative pilot tax reforms and optimizing tax services and the business environment.

Guangzhou is one of the first six pilot cities of business environment innovation determined by the State Council. Since the launch of the pilot program, Guangzhou Tax Service has worked hard to build a new tax service system highlighting “full-range offline services, around-the-clock online services, and extensive customized services”. In this year’s International Exchange Meeting on China's Reform Experience in Optimizing Business Environment (Tax Facilitation Session) hosted by the World Bank, Guangzhou Tax Service, as an excellent Chinese grassroots unit in optimizing tax services and business environment, shared its practices and experience with its counterparts from Pakistan, Ethiopia, Mozambique, and other countries.

Yang Xiaoqiang, Director of the Research Center for Taxation & Financial and Tax law, Sun Yat-Sen University, believed that the establishment of the practice and research center will boost the transformation of cutting-edge research outcomes into the practices of optimizing tax services and business environment in a more scientific and efficient manner. With research and practices combined, the costs of tax compliance for enterprises will be effectively reduced and a fair and transparent tax environment will be shaped. All will further contribute to the improvement of a market-oriented, law-based and international business environment

The official of Guangzhou Tax Service said that in the next stage, the tax authority will make every effort to improve its services and build a business environment that meets the needs of the city’s high-level opening up, responds to the expectations of compatriots in Hong Kong and Macao, and matches its position as a comprehensive cooperation platform among Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macao and open to the world. At the same time, it will continue to promote the national pilot program of business environment innovation, and put various tax reform measures into effect at the earliest possible date.