Heavy rain, hail and strong winds hit parts of northern China on Tuesday and Wednesday, disrupting traffic in Tianjin Municipality, prompting weather alerts in Hebei Province and damaging farmland in Shaanxi Province.
Tianjin issued a blue rainstorm alert, the lowest in China's four-tier warning system, and activated a Level-IV flood-control emergency response on Wednesday. Parts of the municipality saw intense downpours, strong winds and isolated hail throughout the day.
In neighboring Hebei, authorities kept blue rainstorm and yellow thunderstorm-gale alerts in place after heavy rain and strong winds affected parts of the province. Thirteen monitoring stations recorded rainstorm-level rainfall, while 136 reported winds of Force 7 or above.
A roadside tree was brought down in Yuxian County, briefly blocking a highway before police cleared the road.
Heading to Xianyang, Shaanxi Province, severe thunderstorms brought hail and heavy downpours on Tuesday. Some areas received more than 90 mm of rain, leaving farmland waterlogged and damaging crops, local authorities said.
Heavy rain, hail, winds batter parts of north China
China's customs authority will fully play its role in helping achieve higher-quality foreign trade development during the 15th Five-Year Plan period (2026-2030), Head of the General Administration of Customs (GAC) Sun Meijun said at a press conference in Beijing on Wednesday.
The outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan calls for accelerating the building of a strong trading nation, improving the quality and efficiency of foreign trade, and promoting balanced development of imports and exports.
Sun briefed the media on the customs authority's measures to promote innovative development and improve the quality and efficiency of trade.
"We will strengthen new drivers of foreign trade by optimizing the regulatory systems for cross-border e-commerce, market procurement and overseas warehouses. We will also adopt innovative supervision methods for AI products and green and low-carbon transition products," she said.
"We will continue to carry out special actions to facilitate cross-border trade, and effectively implement free trade agreements such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). We will leverage openness to foster cooperation and convenience to counter containment, while consolidating and expanding diversified markets," Sun added.
She noted that during the 15th Five-Year Plan period, China will negotiate and sign more trade access cooperation documents, expand imports of advanced technology equipment, key components, energy resources and quality agricultural products, and diversify source countries.
This will facilitate the export of quality goods from around the world to China and enable them to share the opportunities of China's vast market, while also providing Chinese consumers with a wider range of choices, and promoting a more balanced development of imports and exports.
"We will promote smoother dual circulation by building a regulatory system that aligns with high-standard economic and trade rules, creating a transparent, stable and predictable institutional environment, and innovating customs clearance models and optimizing supervision methods to facilitate efficient and convenient cross-border flow of various factors of production," she said.
China to boost higher-quality foreign trade in 2026-2030: customs authority
