Better business environment, services for market entities

The State Council issued a circular on July 21 to further improve the business environment and better serve market entities.

It stressed more convenience for investment and construction, easier approval process and conditions for enterprise production and operations, optimized business environment for foreign trade and investment, lower thresholds for employment and entrepreneurship, higher business-related service quality and efficiency, and a long-term mechanism for business environment improvement.

Pre-construction approval of investment projects should be optimized and reshaped, the circular said, and that local departments should evaluate, examine preliminary programs once and jointly give feedback after project contractors submit the set of reports on feasibility, land use pre-examination, site selection, environmental impact and safety assessment, in order to accelerate project implementation.

Whole-process review of construction projects online should be expedited. Before the end of this year, approval services with clear standards and fees should be provided online, covering administrative permission, registration, assessment and review, intermediary services, and municipal utility services.

Market entry threshold should be further lowered for project construction, education, medical service, and sports, among others, as unreasonable barriers concerning enterprise qualification, funds, proportion of stock, personnel and location should be removed at once, according to the circular.

The industrial licensing authority concerning major industrial products should be delegated to the provincial level this year, amid reducing administrative control on industrial production and distribution.

As for cutting costs for small and micro enterprises, the circular promoted platforms to reduce commission fees and charges.

In order to boost customs clearance efficiency for imports and exports, "pre-arrival declaration" should be further promoted. It allows enterprises to make a declaration in advance, allowing inspection and release to be completed as soon as goods arrive in a customs surveillance zone.

"Single window" application in international trade should also be widened. The circular stressed expediting the "single window" solution, now used in law enforcement for customs clearance at ports, to other international trade links, such as port logistics and related services.

Meanwhile, it stressed removing more operational and investment barriers to foreign-invested and foreign trade firms, such as offering all prefecture level and above cities in the country mandates to register foreign-invested firms.

The circular stressed talent mobility and flexible employment, requiring efforts to obtain inter-regional online verification of professional titles by the end of June 2021.

And it called on efforts to speed up the assessment of released policies concerning access to and supervision of new business forms, adding that supplies such as application scenarios should be increased for new forms.

A slew of measures should be adopted to facilitate starting and operating businesses, it said. For example, all procedures for starting a business should be completed online, the system for enterprises to register their names should get smarter in name verification, the application of electronic business licenses and seals should be accelerated in areas such as taxes, human resources, social security, housing provident funds and commercial banks, and location restrictions on business registration applying to micro, small enterprises and self-employed people should be relaxed.

Tax services should be improved continuously, it said. By the end of 2020, value-added tax invoices should be online, and major tax services should also be offered online.

Also, the efficiency of registering trademarks as well as the frequency of updating data on the online trademark service system should be increased, and the system's smart search function should be improved.

The circular asked for improvements in financing guaranteed by movable properties, and encouraged commercial banks to support financing for medium and small businesses with their movable properties as guarantees such as accounts receivable, production equipment, products, vehicles, ships and intellectual property.

The long-term mechanism of bettering the business environment should be improved, through building and refining policy assessment systems, setting up regular communication mechanisms between governments and enterprises, and strengthening delivery of preferential policies for enterprises, the circular said.