The National Audit Office says China is losing large amounts of tax revenue from some enterprises' dishonest bookkeeping.

The office conducted a survey of tax revenue from close to eight hundred enterprises in 35 cities and found at least one hundred of the companies had problems with their accounting and reporting and also abused preferential tax policies.

Meanwhile, the departments' failure to collect taxes also contributes to revenue losses, which amounted to over two and half a billion yuan or more than US$300 million from 2002 to September 2003.

Efforts are currently being made to improve the situation.

(CRI September 18, 2004)