Recently, the Office of Credit of the Ministry of Commerce of the People’s Republic of China (MOFCOM) and the Office of Contact with Industrial Associations of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council (SASAC) jointly issued the Opinions on Further Improvement of Industrial Credit Rating (Shang Xin Yong Zi No.1[2015], hereinafter referred to as the Opinions), setting the overall objective to accelerate the construction of an industrial credit system with organization of industrial associations and chambers of commerce, third-party cooperation, participation of member enterprises, guidance and promotion of government and social supervision and collaboration.

 

The Opinions said that, the industrial associations and chambers of commerce should give full play to their leading role in industrial credit management, continuously improve the industrial credit supervision system, establish industrial credit management platform and cultivate culture of industrial credit. They should be able to correctly handle the relationship between benefit and efficiency in terms of credit rating services at the same of innovating the industrial credit rating modes and making exploration for market-oriented credit services.

 

It said that, the third-party credit service organizations should give full play to their role in supporting industrial credit rating. The member enterprises should pay high attention to and highly motivated to participate in industrial credit rating and spare no efforts to improve their credit management. The industrial associations and chambers of commerce, the third-party credit service organizations and the member enterprises should accept social supervision in the process of industrial credit rating to establish a pattern with mutual supervision by all participators and joint efforts to promote industrial credit rating.

 

The Opinions made further improvement of the standards and procedures for investigation into qualifications of industrial associations and chambers of commerce participating in industrial credit rating and review of results of credit rating for member enterprises. It said that, any industrial associations or chambers of commerce involving violation of regulations or dishonesty will be disqualified from participating in industrial credit rating; for any enterprises rated above A Level, in case of any violation of regulations or dishonesty, their credit ratings will be cancelled by related industrial associations or chambers of commerce. In addition, the industrial associations and chambers of commerce and enterprises mentioned above will be blacklisted in the Database of the MOFCOM on Credit of Enterprises in Commercial Field. The results of credit rating will be made public through the “Industrial Credit Rating and Recording Management System” of the MOFCOM (xypjweb.mofcom.gov.cn) and www.12312.gov.cn.

 

Since 2005, in order to standardize and manage the order of the market economy and promote industrial credit improvement, the MOFCOM and the SASAC have made joint efforts to promote industrial credit rating. So far, 207 national industrial associations and chambers of commerce have participated in the work and more than 10,000 enterprises have been rated above A Level. These enterprises are from a variety of industries and fields, covering agriculture, machinery, electronics, petrochemical, electricity, water conservancy, construction, medicine and domestic and foreign trade.

 

The Opinions is an important measure of the MOFCOM and the SASAC for putting the Outline of the Plan for Construction of Social Credit System (2014 - 2020) into practice. The next step, the MOFCOM and the SASAC will further enhance the guidance and standardization and promote the application of the industrial credit rating results in the fields of administrative licensing, qualification accreditation, government procurement, tendering and bidding and policy support to fully reflect the market value and social value of the rating results.

 

Source: www.mofcom.gov.cn, August 17, 2015