Chinese Government to use blockchain in custom clearances

The Chinese government has announced that it plans to use blockchain in numerous aspects of cross-border trade in Hangzhou. The statement discussed the logistics and ecommerce enterprises in Hangzhou, which manages around $37.4 billion in terms of imports and exports. As such it has one of the biggest custom clearances where imports and exports are checked which according to them is currently digitized. The Hangzhou’s import clearance times have been reduced from an average of 191 hours to 27 hours, with exports only at 0.2 hours.

The release is concerned with warehouse clearance rather than ports. The new project, in collaboration with the  Hangzhou Internet Court plans for data from customs clearance, exchanges, taxation, transportation, and payments to be stored on a blockchain. This will improve the trustworthiness of information and, in turn, make for efficient auditing.