MOFCOM Announces Access Requirements for Processing Trade Enterprises
The Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) required commerce departments at all levels to check the operation and production capacity of local processing trade enterprises and use the findings as an important basis for granting approval for processing trade activities.MOFCOM issued the Circular on Issues Concerning the Strengthening of Processing Trade Management on 12 April 2007, calling on processing trade enterprises to optimise their structure, improve efficiency, make proprietary innovations and actively take up social responsibility. The circular is aimed at forbidding processing trade enterprises from engaging in the processing of high energy consumption, high pollution and low value-added products, thereby expediting the transformation and upgrading of processing trade and promoting its healthy development. Commerce departments at all levels are urged to strengthen their management of the market access requirements for processing trade enterprises. Commerce departments at all levels are also demanded to take environmental protection, energy consumption, employment, equipment and other factors into consideration in granting approval. Enterprises that fail to reach environmental and energy consumption standards and those causing environmental damage will not be allowed to engage in processing trade activities. Also, those employing workers without complying with standard procedures or failing to meet local minimum wage requirements as well as those failing to comply with local social insurance requirements will not be given access to the industry. Enterprises using backward equipment and technologies that have been officially listed as obsolete will be barred from engaging in processing trade while new enterprises using equipment and technologies under the restricted category will no longer be allowed to engage in processing trade. The circular also announces that with effect from 1 July 2007, applications by processing trade enterprises for the domestic sale of bonded materials and components will be handled by commerce departments that originally issued the Processing Trade Approval Certificate in accordance with the Provisional Administrative Measures on the Examination and Approval of Domestic Sales of Bonded Materials and Components Imported for Processing Trade. However, if the goods involve quotas, permits and other special administrative measures, they will still require the approval of provincial commerce departments or MOFCOM.
