A tourist checks out goods at a duty-free shop in Sanya, Hainan province, on March 12. [Photo/Xinhua]
China's island province of Hainan raked in 55.07 billion yuan (about $7.78 billion) in duty-free sales in the past nine years, according to customs of the provincial capital city of Haikou.
The State Council gave Hainan permission to run a pilot offshore duty-free program on April 20, 2011, in an effort to make the island a world-class tourist destination.
Statistics showed that duty-free shops in Hainan received over 16.09 million customers and sold over 72 million duty-free goods over the past nine years.
In January last year, Hainan opened two new offshore duty-free shops in Haikou and Qionghai, adding to the previous two in Haikou and Sanya.
The province opened two duty-free experience shops in Sanya last week where customers are allowed to visit the bricks-and-mortar stores and place orders online.
Work at construction sites in the Haikou Jiangdong New District, a new 298-square-kilometer benchmark area to promote...