To overcome the economic difficulties caused by the COVID-19 pandemic this year, the Zhejiang authorities have been optimizing the business environment for foreign investors and making every effort to stabilize foreign trade and investment.

From January to June this year, there were 1,133 newly established foreign-invested enterprises in Zhejiang, with contractual foreign capital of $16.41 billion and actual utilized foreign capital of $7.05 billion, up 7.9 percent year-on-year, 11.9 percent higher than that of the national average. The growth rate ranks first among major coastal provinces and municipalities in China.

The impressive economic performance can be attributed to the efforts made by the province's taxation authorities, who are working efficiently to better serve the urgent financial needs of foreign firms amid the pandemic.

For instance, Owens Corning Composite Material (China) Corporation, based in Hangzhou, the provincial capital of Zhejiang, has so far made five applications for export rebates this year, receiving total refunds of 5.4 million yuan ($771,120). The timely refunding has greatly helped the American multinational, and its confidence in Zhejiang's business environment has prompted it to carry out new projects in the province: Owens Corning (Hangzhou) Glass Fibre Co Ltd has already started operating, and its revenue is expected to reach around a half of that of Owens Corning Composite Material (China) Corporation.

Zhejiang's taxation authorities also provide fast-track services to encourage foreign investment programs. A subsidiary of Sunking Power Electronics Group located in Jiashan county, Zhejiang province has been operating in the province and delivering electrical equipment for 16 years. It has managed to add a new program related to IGBT power semiconductors this year, with the assistance of the local tax administration.

After learning about Hong Kong Sunking Pacific Limited's (Sunking Power Electronics Group's sole shareholder) plans to invest its undistributed profits into the new program, the county's tax administration immediately sent a team to address its concerns about withholding income tax as an extraterritorial investor. As a result, full funding for the program was granted as soon as possible.