This aerial photo taken on Sept 12, 2023 shows a view of the container terminal of Haikou Port in Haikou, South China's Hainan province. [Photo/Xinhua]

The General Administration of Customs has introduced 16 reform measures to foster the high-quality development of processing trade by tackling the challenges and issues that hinder its growth, said an official on Tuesday.

These measures, such as expanding the application scope for companies' processing trade supervision methods and implementing new bonded policies, aim to stabilize market expectations, the foundation of foreign investment and trade, and the supply chains. They are intended to inject vitality into the growth of processing trade, said Huang Lingli, deputy director of the GAC's commodity inspection department.

Processing trade refers to the business activity of importing all, or part of, the raw and auxiliary materials from abroad, and re-exporting the finished products after processing or assembly by companies within the Chinese mainland.

As a crucial component of China's foreign trade, Huang said processing trade plays a vital role in facilitating external openness, driving industrial upgrading, stabilizing supply chains, ensuring employment and improving people's livelihoods.

China's processing trade amounted to 5.57 trillion yuan ($761.22 billion) between January and September of 2023, accounting for 18.1 percent of the country's total foreign trade value, data from the GAC showed.