China Travel Advice

Q: I will need to bring in more the 500 grams of smokeless tobacco to meet my needs for a 90-100 day visit, is this allowed by paying a duty? How much would the duty be? Do I simply declare it at customs and pay the tax?

Do you mean you'll need to bring more than 500 grams of tobacco? By the rules of the Chinese customs, when entering mainland China, residents of Hong Kong can bring in, duty-free, up to 200 cigarettes, or 250 grams of tobacco, or 50 cigars; passengers from other parts of the world are allowed up 400 cigarettes, 500 grams of tobacco, or 100 cigars.

It seems that, for the amount of tobacco above the allowed limit, the Chinese customs charges 50% as duty, that is, half of the value of the goods. Each cigarette is valued at about 0.5 Chinese dollars. Let's say one brings in two hundred cigarettes above the 400 duty-free cigarettes, the value of the goods is 100 Chinese dollars, on which he'll pay 50 Chinese dollars for duty.

For the extra goods to be allowed in with duty paid, the tobacco must still be for one's own use. In other words, it cannot be more than one can reasonably consume. Don't know how they handle a stay of 90 to 100 days. For sailors who do port calls, there is the rule 400 cigarettes maximum for a 10 day stay.