State Council decides to tackle shanty towns

The State Council, China's Cabinet, decided at an executive meeting on May 24 that China will rebuild 15 million units of housing in a shanty town transformation drive. The meeting, presided over by Premier Li Keqiang, said the country will carry out a plan (from 2018-20) for rebuilding shanty towns, or settlements of improvised housing, nationwide and the central government will increase fiscal support for the project. Preferential financial and land policies will be devised and innovation will be encouraged to support the program, according to the meeting. In 2014, China set a goal of reconstructing shanty towns and "urban villages" - less developed rural areas remaining in a fast-urbanized city - to accommodate 100 million people.

Reform to improve vocational qualification

An executive meeting of the State Council, presided over by Premier Li Keqiang on May 24, released a list of approved vocational qualifications after eliminating and merging some qualifications. The list will be dynamically adjusted in accordance with changes in the real situation, but any addition of new vocational qualifications must be approved by the State Council, the meeting said. Since 2014, China has eliminated 434 vocational qualifications, or more than 70 percent of the total number of vocational qualifications, to leave less room for local government agencies and industrial associations to charge fees for vocational qualifications.

Gov't affairs to be made more public

The general office of the State Council released a plan for making government affairs more public at grassroots agencies. According to the plan, 100 counties and cities would be selected from 15 provinces and municipalities, such as Anhui and Shaanxi provinces and Beijing municipality, to carry out the work of better publicizing government affairs. The work mainly involves urban and rural planning and major construction projects. Government agencies involved in the plan should improve building of public affair platforms to facilitate online inquiries by the public. The move will help improve the efficiency of governance at grassroots levels and play a significant role in building a rule-based and service-oriented government, the plan said.

Document to support county economy

The general office of the State Council released a document on encouraging innovation-driven development at county level. The guideline maps out eight tasks for driving county-level innovation, such as industrial upgrading, fostering of innovation-oriented enterprises and innovative professionals, targeted poverty reduction, and improving the work of spreading scientific knowledge to educate farmers.

China to exchange financial information

Six central ministries, including the State Administration of Taxation, the Ministry of Finance, the central bank, and the banking, securities and insurance commissions, jointly released a document on tax-related investigations of non-residential financial accounts to combat cross-border tax evasion. In 2014, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development released the Standard for Automatic Exchange of Financial Account Information, and in the document, the six Chinese ministries vowed to abide by the OECD standard. China will conduct the first information exchange in September next year.

Central funding to improve environment

The Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, the Ministry of Environmental Protection, and the National Energy Administration jointly released a circular on supporting a trial clean-heating program in winter in northern regions. According to the circular, fiscal funding from the central government will be earmarked for supporting such programs that are set to improve the air quality in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. Beijing, Tianjin and 26 other cities in North China's Hebei and Shanxi provinces, East China's Shandong province and Central China's Henan province will be covered by the funding program. Cities with clear working plans and innovative working mechanisms will have priority for receiving funding, according to the circular.