29/09/2020

On 9 September 2020, the Standardisation Administration of China (SAC) released the China Standardisation Development Annual Report (2019). The report is a flagship publication that every year reviews and summarises the key takeaways from China’s standardisation work.

In particular, the report illustrates that, in 2019, China achieved the following key results:

  • Released 2,021 national standards;
  • Prepared and established 41 national professional standardisation technology organisations – including one dedicated to blockchain;
  • Filed 4,880 new industry standards and 7,238 local standards;
  • Added 6,227 association standards;
  • Added an additional 55,962 self-declared enterprise standards, bringing the total number of self-declared enterprise standards released to over 370,000.

In terms of deepening the standardisation reform, in 2019 China further integrated and streamlined mandatory standards. In particular, the National Development and Reform Commission, the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Transport, and the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, have proactively promoted the integration and revision of mandatory national standards to support the policy of “Three Inspections in One” for road vehicles. Recommended national standards were also further optimised, by adopting strict approval procedures which led to an increase of the project rejection rate of recommended national standards to 52%. Association standards also developed rapidly, with more than 12,000 association standards released by more than 3,000 social organisations, covering areas such as smart transportation, sharing economy, and elderly care services. Enterprise standards were also further invigorated through the deep implementation of the enterprise standards ‘top runner’ scheme, which in 2019 selected 315 enterprise standards from 245 companies. Finally, in 2019 China also actively promoted the comprehensive reform of local standardisation: Shanxi, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and other provinces refined 11 standards, including on regional coordination, which can be replicated and promoted on a wider scale; 8 regional coordination standards were also released for the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region, while Hainan, Zhengzhou and Yiwu explored and actively promoted city-centred standardisation innovation.

 

In terms of the construction of standards systems, in 2019 China achieved remarkable results especially in (i) agricultural and rural standardisation work, and (ii) food quality and safety:

  • For the agricultural and rural standards system, China introduced a new era of top-level design of standardisation; it issued and implemented 113 national standards for various fields, including agricultural input quality safety assurance, animal and plant disease prevention and control, and agricultural product quality classification; and focused on establishing a comprehensive, whole-chain, multi-layer and modern agricultural standards system.
  • For the food quality and safety standards system, China continued to promote the establishment of a national food quality and safety standards system; it comprehensively carried out the clearance and streamlining of national food quality standards, it promoted the upgrading of manufacturing standards, and promoted the establishment of new industrial standards systems.

In addition, in 2019 China vigorously promoted the standardisation of elderly care services and domestic service industry; formulated national standards for urban rail transit facilities and operations; promoted the establishment of a standards system for national ecological pilot sites; promoted the standardisation of pilots projects on community-level government; summarised successful experiences in standardisation that can be replicated and promoted on a wider scale, gained from sectors such as construction of ‘beautiful towns and villages’, rural property rights transfer, new urbanisation, urban-industrial integration, etc.

 

Furthermore, the Report also indicates that China in 2019 further enhanced the functions of the National Standards Full Text Disclosure System, disclosing 1,804 standards. An information service platform for industry standards and local standards was established; while the international standards information platform, the China-Europe and the China-Germany standardisation platforms achieved effective linkages with other international and foreign standards such as ISO, IEC, German, French, and Spanish standards. The National Public Service Platform for Standard Information provided more than 180 national and industry standards from Kazakhstan, Russia, Sweden and other countries. The National Standard Implementation Feedback Platform was put into operation, while the National Standard Formulation and Revision System was also introduced – featuring a mechanism for collecting and processing feedback on standards implementation. Linkages were also established to connect standardisation work with law enforcement, inspections, and quality management, so to contribute to standards formulation and information-sharing. Moreover, China further improved evaluation methods for the effectiveness of implementation of national standards, and successfully evaluated a set of key standards in the field of engineered wood and cosmetics – thus providing direct evidence for the revision of relevant standards. Finally, the number of legal persons and other organisations in the Unified Social Credit Code Database exceeded 100 million for the first time – reaching 101.92 million, an increase of 26.75% from 2018; the registration coverage was further expanded, covering more than 30 types of institutions. The national commodity database was also strengthened, with the total amount of data entries in the database exceeding 100 million and ranking first in the world.

 

For the Chinese version of the report, please visit

http://www.sac.gov.cn/sxxgk/zcwj/202008/P020200827470578698634.pdf