Guangzhou (JLC), March 4, 2026-China has rolled out preferential import tax policies for the exploration, development, and utilization of energy resources during the 15th Five-Year Plan period, a notice released by the State Taxation Administration in February shows.
The policies, effective from January 1, 2026 to December 31, 2030, have defined the following:
1) For self-operated projects engaged in oil and natural gas exploration and development in China's maritime areas (referring to China's internal seas, territorial waters, continental shelves and other sea areas under China's jurisdiction over marine resources, including shallow seas and tidal flats, the same below), as well as for offshore oil and gas pipeline emergency rescue projects, import tariffs shall be exempted on equipment (including technical documents that come with the equipment as per the contract), instruments, spare parts, accessories, and special tools that cannot be manufactured domestically or whose domestic counterparts cannot meet the performance needs, and that are directly used in exploration and development or emergency rescue.
2) For Sino-foreign cooperative projects engaged in oil and natural gas exploration and development in China's marine areas, including those "old projects" that had been approved before December 31, 1994, import tariffs and import VAT shall be exempted on equipment (including technical documents that come with the equipment as per the contract), instruments, spare parts, accessories, and special tools that cannot be manufactured domestically or whose domestic counterparts cannot meet the performance needs, and that are directly used in exploration and development.
3) For imported natural gas (including pipeline natural gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG), the same below) received by cross-border natural gas pipelines and LNG receiving, storage, and transportation facilities projects approved by the National Development and Reform Commission, as well as by expansion projects for receiving, storing, and transporting imported LNG approved by provincial governments, the import VAT shall be refunded at a certain proportion.
Specifically, for imported natural gas under long-term trading contracts signed before the end of 2014 and confirmed by the National Development and Reform Commission, the import VAT shall be refunded at a rate of 70%.
As for the other imported natural gas, when the import price is higher than the reference benchmark value, the import VAT shall be refunded at a rate of 80% of the inverted gap ratio between the item's import price and its reference benchmark value, which should be calculated in this formula: inverted gap ratio = (import price - reference benchmark value) / import price, and on a quarterly basis.
