Residents of the Pingtan Comprehensive Pilot Zone (PCPZ) in Fujian province will soon be able to buy luxury imported vehicles at a lower price, thanks to a new policy, local news portal ptnet.cn reports.

Fujian’s authorities recently rolled out the pilot scheme for "parallel imports," widely expected to bring down the prices of premium cars in the Chinese mainland.

"Parallel imports" refers to the practice of car dealers importing vehicles from foreign markets to China without the permission of the manufacturer or the authorized distributor.

According to details, qualified enterprises – those with at least one-year auto sales experience and 10-million-yuan registered capital – can apply to participate in the scheme, which has been adopted by other FTZs in Shanghai and Tianjin.

The companies must also have a physical dealership that offers maintenance, services and auto parts sales, as well as good credit.

“Parallel imports” creates a new import method for domestic auto dealers which is usually 10 to 20 percent cheaper than on the domestic market, the Haixi Morning Post quoted an insider as saying.

The scheme is expected to impact the imported cars market, leading to fierce competition and lowering the overall price of imported cars, which is good news for customers, he said.

Yet, the majority of parallel imports are high-end cars usually costing more than 500,000 yuan ($80,550), a price affordable only to a small portion of people, he added.