Tag: Standardization Law

NPCSC Criminalized National Anthem Disrespect, Applied National Anthem Law to SARs & Authorized Nationwide Supervision System and Armed Police Reforms

UPDATE (Nov. 22, 2017): This post has been updated with the explanations of two decisions passed by the 30th Session of the 12th NPCSC. See details below.

The 12th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) concluded its 30th Session last Saturday with the passage of various laws and decisions. This post is a quick rundown of the actions taken by the the NPCSC at the close of the session. Unfortunately, due to other things requiring much of our attention, this time we aren’t able to include the usual level of details as we did before. Apologies. Also, please let us know if any of the links below directs to the wrong webpage—we wrote this blog post in a hurry.

Continue reading “NPCSC Criminalized National Anthem Disrespect, Applied National Anthem Law to SARs & Authorized Nationwide Supervision System and Armed Police Reforms” →

NPCSC to Consider New Criminal Law Amendment, Apply National Anthem Law to SARs & Hear Judicial Reform Reports

The NPC Observer turns one today! Many thanks to our readers, subscribers, and Twitter followers for the amazing past year. By the way, we are now on Facebook—because. . . why not?

UPDATE (Oct. 30, 2017): The finalized agenda and daily schedule of the session are released. One new item—a draft decision to carry out pilots to reform the state supervision system in an additional 28 provinces*—was added to the agenda just a day after the Communist Party announced that it had made such a decision. We will report on the details of the NPCSC decision either tomorrow when the full NPCSC hears an explanation of it or when the NPCSC passes it on November 4.

*The reform will therefore be carried out in 31 of 32 of China’s provincial-level administrative divisions (excluding Hong Kong and Macau).

Buried in the pre-19th Communist Party Congress propaganda frenzy was a bland official report on the Council of Chairmen’s latest meeting on October 16. The Council decided that the 30th—and third last—session of the 12th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) would take place from October 30 to November 4, consistent with our earlier predictions. This post is a (fairly detailed) rundown of the items on the Session’s agenda.

Continue reading “NPCSC to Consider New Criminal Law Amendment, Apply National Anthem Law to SARs & Hear Judicial Reform Reports” →

NPCSC Solicits Public Comments on Three Draft Laws (with Brief Content Summary): September 7, 2017 (UPDATED)

Update (September 13, 2017): China Law Translate has translated the draft revisions to the Law Against Unfair Competition (linked below).

After releasing the draft revisions to the People’s Court Organic Law and the People’s Procuratorates Organic Law for public comments on Monday, the NPCSC is now soliciting public opinions on three additional laws.

The comments period for the following two laws will end on September 24—i.e., it lasts only 20 days, which signals the NPCSC will almost certainly consider and pass the two bills at its next session in late October.

  1. Law Against Unfair Competition (Draft Revision) (English translation) 反不正当竞争法修订草案二次审议稿
  2. Standardization Law (Draft Revision) 标准化法修订草案二次审议稿

The comments period for the third draft law, Tobacco Leaf Tax Law (烟叶税法草案), will run till October 6. The tax rate is 20%.

Only PDF Chinese versions are available at this time. Officials explanations are included in the PDFs.

Continue reading “NPCSC Solicits Public Comments on Three Draft Laws (with Brief Content Summary): September 7, 2017 (UPDATED)” →

29th Session Watch Pt. 1: NPCSC to Consider Revisions of Laws Organizing China’s Judicial System

The Council of Chairmen met on August 18 and decided that the 29th—and fourth last—session of the 12th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) will take place from August 28 to September 1. The agenda proposed by the Council of Chairmen is explained below.

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Legislation Review: China to Revamp Standardization System

Closely examine the packaging of any Chinese consumer product and you will most certainly find in the fine print the letters “GB”—the symbol for compulsory national standards. Sitting at the top of China’s standards hierarchy, the “GB” standards are formulated by the State Council and compliance with them is mandatory. Local governments and private entities may also adopt standards, and in many cases compliance is merely voluntary. Together, these standards prescribe uniform technical requirements for diverse fields ranging from purified water bottling to pharmaceutical manufacturing.

Yet, as the Chinese Government itself has recognized, the current standardization system—established in the late 1980s with the enactment of the Standardization Law (1989 Law)—no longer meets actual needs and has even slowed development. In an effort to modernize the system, earlier this year the State Council submitted to the NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) a draft revision to the Law (Draft), which the NPCSC reviewed last month. The Draft essentially aims at restructuring the existing standardization system, and below we provide a summary of its core content.

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NPCSC Solicits Public Opinions on Three Draft Laws: May 16, 2017 (UPDATED)

Update/Correction (May 26, 2017): The comments period for the draft National Intelligence Law now ends on June 4, 2017, NOT June 14. This post originally stated that the Law underwent a second reading at the NPCSC’s April session. This did not happen and we apologize for the mistake.

Update (May 18, 2017): China Law Translate has also translated the draft National Intelligence Law here.

Update (May 17, 2017): The China Copyright and Media blog has posted an English translation of the draft National Intelligence Law here.

The NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) is now soliciting public opinions on the following three draft legislations. The comments period currently runs through June 14, but since the NPCSC has yet to officially announce this round of solicitation of public comments on the frontpage of its website, the deadline might be extended. We will announce any change to the comments period here and on Twitter.

  1. Standardization Law (Draft Revision) (标准化法修订草案)
  2. Nuclear Safety Law (2nd Deliberation Draft) (核安全法草案二次审议稿)
  3. National Intelligence Law (Draft) (国家情报法草案)

The hyperlinks above direct to PDF versions of the draft laws, which are currently in Chinese only. We will update this post and make announcements on Twitter if and when the bills become available in other formats or languages.

We have summarized the draft revision to the Standardization Law here. Also, it now seems unlikely that the NPCSC will release the draft revision to the Securities Law for public comments. (But maybe the delay is purely for technical reasons as the bill contains more than 300 articles—who knows).

Click here to submit comments online. Please refer to our guide if you have trouble navigating the online comments system. The individual pages for the bills also contain notes (in Chinese) on their content.

Comments can also be mailed to the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission (全国人大常委会法制工作委员会) at the following address:

Chinese: 北京市西城区前门西大街1号 邮编：100805
English: No. 1 West Qianmen Avenue, Xicheng District, Beijing 100805

Please clearly write “[BILL NAME IN CHINESE]征求意见” on the envelope.

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27th Session Watch Pt. 2: NPCSC Concludes Session with New Laws, Decisions

Earlier this afternoon, at the closing meeting of its 27th Session, the 12th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) voted on and approved a series of legislative bills as well as decisions on personnel and reform of the judicial system. The following is a quick review of the actions taken by the NPCSC today.

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27th Session Watch Pt. 1: NPCSC to Consider Securities Law Revision, Renew People’s Assessor System Reform

As we have predicted earlier, the Council of Chairmen met today to set the dates and agenda for this month’s NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) session. It decided that the 27th Session of the 12th NPCSC will take place from April 24 to 27. As usual, this post summarizes the official press release of the Council’s meeting, along with other pertinent information.

Continue reading “27th Session Watch Pt. 1: NPCSC to Consider Securities Law Revision, Renew People’s Assessor System Reform” →