Tourists buy goods at a duty-free shop in Haikou, South China's Hainan Province on Monday. The island has had a tax exemption policy for nine years. Local customs said sales reached 55.07 billion yuan (xxxx) in the first quarter. Photo:cnsphoto

China's top tax watchdog said Wednesday that the country's tax and fee cuts totaled 742.8 billion yuan (about 105 billion US dollars) in the first quarter (Q1) of the year.

Of the total, the preferential tax and fee measures unveiled in 2020 to support economic development and the containment of the COVID-19 epidemic saved a total of 318.2 billion yuan, Cai Zili, an official with the State Taxation Administration, told a press conference.

The remaining 424.6 billion yuan of taxes and fees were reduced as a result of the implementation of a larger scale of tax and fee cut policies rolled out last year.

In Q1, authorities collected a total of 3.48 trillion yuan in tax revenue after deducting export tax rebates, down 16.4 percent year on year.

The tax revenue drop was expected to narrow in Q2 as the resumption of life and production was accelerating, Cai said.

Since the outbreak of the epidemic, China has rolled out a slew of tax and fee relief measures to alleviate the burdens of market entities, especially small firms and self-employed businesses.