Encouraged Industry Eligibility

The Free Trade Port's headline corporate income tax rate is not available to every entity registered in Hainan. It is available to enterprises whose activity falls within an encouraged-industry catalogue, and the catalogue is specific: it is organised around what a business actually does, not around how it describes itself. An entity can be genuinely operating in Hainan, entirely compliantly, and still sit outside it.

This is the single decision most worth getting right before formation, because the business scope filed at registration is what an assessment will be read against. A scope drafted loosely, or drafted to keep future options open, can put an otherwise qualifying business on the wrong side of the line — and amending scope after the fact is a filing exercise that invites the question of why it was needed.

There is usually a revenue-composition condition attached as well: qualifying is not merely about naming an encouraged activity, but about that activity being a substantial enough part of what the entity actually earns from. That shapes the business model, not just the paperwork, and it is better understood before a group decides which of its activities to put in the Hainan entity.

We assess the intended activity against the catalogue in force, draft the scope to match it, and set out the position in writing with its basis. Where the activity does not qualify, we say so — an optimistic filing leaves the exposure with you, not with us. The catalogue and its conditions are periodically revised, so we confirm against the current published version at the time of the engagement rather than working from a prior year's.