Summary:

• The laws and regulations series of individual income tax have come into force since 1st January 2019, and the individual income tax paid by employees is generally reduced.
  
• The Notice of the Administration for Market Regulation on the Launch of the New Business License was gazetted by the State Administration for Market Regulation. The new version of business license will be launched on 1st March 2019.
  
• The Measures on Wages Payment by Enterprises in Jilin Province has been adopted and gazetted by Jilin Provincial Government, which stipulates some special requirements such as payroll items, payment time of the wages for the resigned employees and “downtime” wages.
• The Tianjin Special Equipment Safety Regulations was gazetted by the Standing Committee of the Tianjin Municipal People’s Congress, which refines and supplements the relevant provisions of the upper-level law and guarantees the implementation of the responsibility of the main body of special equipment safety management.
  
• The Law of PRC on Prevention and Control of Pollution from Environmental Noise has been adopted on 29th December 2018, which stipulates that the environmental protection acceptance check for the environmental noise pollution prevention and control facilities of the construction project is revised to be carried out by the construction entity.
  
• The Law of PRC on Environmental Impact Assessment has been adopted on 29th December 2018, which canceled the qualification requirements for the EIA compiling entities. The construction entity and the EIA compiling entity respectively assume corresponding responsibilities.
• The Measures for Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessment has been gazetted by the Ministry of Ecological Environment, which has comprehensively revised the relevant provisions on public participation in EIA of construction project.
  
• Updated Minimum Wage Standard of Chongqing Municipality.

Contents

Labour

• Laws and Regulations Series of Individual Income Tax
• < Notice of the Administration for Market Regulation on the Launch of the New Business License >
• < Measures on Wages Payment by Enterprises in Jilin Province >

Health and Safety

• < Tianjin Special Equipment Safety Regulations >
  

Environment

• < Law of PRC on Prevention and Control of Pollution from Environmental Noise >
  
• < Law of PRC on Environmental Impact Assessment >
  
• < Measures for Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessment >

Supplement

Minimum Wage Standard Update

• Chongqing Municipality
  

Summary of Law Updates:

Labour

1. < Laws and Regulations Series of Individual Income Tax > (2019-01-01)

The laws and regulations series, such as Individual Income Tax Law of the People’s Republic of China, Implementation Regulations for Individual Income Tax Law of the People’s Republic of China, Administrative Measures on Withholding and Declaration of Individual Income Tax (Trial), Interim Measures on Special Additional Deduction of Individual Income Tax, Operation Measures on Special Additional Deduction of Individual Income Tax (Trial), Announcement on Relevant Issues of Individual Income Tax Declaration, have come into force since 1st January 2019. The main influences or changes are:

• Employees can choose declaration by themselves or choose to be withheld tax by the withholding agent (employer).
  
• The individual income tax paid by employees is generally reduced. The reduction factors are:
  1)The individual income tax threshold is raised from RMB 3,500 to RMB 5,000 (ｅｘｅｃuted on 1st October 2018);
  2)Adding 6 types of special additional deduction of individual income tax. They are: children’s education, continuing education, major medical care, housing loan interest or housing rent, and support for the elderly.
• In the same employer within the same year, the amount of tax paid by employees in each month will be different with an increasing trend in one year.
  

2. < Notice of the Administration for Market Regulation on the Launch of the New Business License > (2018-12-19)

The Notice of the Administration for Market Regulation on the Launch of the New Business License was gazetted on 19th December 2018 by the State Administration forMarket Regulation. The new version of business license will be launched on 1st March 2019. All types of market entities that existed before may continue to use the original business license, or apply for a new version of business license.

3. < Measures on Wages Payment by Enterprises in Jilin Province > (2019-02-01)

Measures on Wages Payment by Enterprises in Jilin Province (Hereinafter referred to as the Measures) has been adopted and gazetted by the 26th ｅｘｅｃutive meeting of Jilin Provincial Government on 7th December 2019, and will come into force on 1st February 2019.

Compared to Interim Provisions on Wages Payment by Enterprises in Jilin Province (2017), the main changes for the Measures are as follows:

• Items are added onto payrolls: enterprise name, working days, overtime hours;
  
• The payment time of the wages for the resigned employees is changed from “before the termination (release) of the labour contract” to “within 5 days from the date of dissolving or terminating the labour contract”;
• If the enterprise stops production or goes out of business for reasons other than the employees themselves and does not exceed one wage payment cycle, wages shall still be paid to the employees according to the labour contracts. If such period exceeds one wage payment cycle, wage payment will be changed from “The enterprise may renegotiate with employees to alter the contents related to the wage payment in the labour contract, and pay employees wages according to the agreement of altered labour contract.” to “If employees have provided normal work, the enterprise shall pay employees wages of not lower than the local minimum wage standard; However, if the employees have not provided normal work, the enterprise shall pay employees wages of more than 70% of the local minimum wage standard, and the actual amount paid shall not be lower than the local minimum standards of living.” Special situations are added as: “Except for the situations that stipulated by laws or regulations or appointed by both parties in addition.”

Health and Safety

1. < Tianjin Special Equipment Safety Regulations > (2018-11-01)

The Tianjin Special Equipment Safety Regulations (hereinafter referred to as the Regulation) was approved by the fifth meeting of the Standing Committee of the seventeenth People’s Congress of Tianjin on 29th September 2018 and it has come into force on 1st November 2018. The main contents of the Regulation are as follows:

The Regulation consists of seven chapters and 69 articles, including general rules, production, operation and use, inspection and testing, supervision and management, accident emergency rescue and investigation, legal liability and supplementary regulations.

• The Regulation  refines and supplements some of the provisions on the responsibility of production, operation and use units of the Special Equipment Safety Law of the People’s Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Special Equipment Safety Law), clearly defines some ambiguous safety responsibility and guides the enterprises to improve their safety awareness of special equipment, enhance their safety management ability of special equipment, and implement their responsibility of the safety main body of the enterprise special equipment.
  
• After the Regulation came out, the supervision of elevator safety will be further strengthened:
  1). To strengthen the propaganda work of elevator safety;
  2). To continuously carry on the quality sample inspection of elevator maintenance;
  3). To carry out annual assessment of elevator maintenance units;
  4). To strengthen daily safety inspection;
  5). To strengthen the implementation of complaints reporting;
  6). To strengthen the investigation and punishment for violations of laws and regulations in the field of elevator safety.
  
• The Regulation imposes compulsory provisions on the rental entity and lending entity of special equipment, and stipulates the agreement on the responsibility of use and management for both rental parties and borrowing parties.
  
• The Regulation summarizes the recall experience after the implementation of the Special Equipment Safety Law, and clarifies the specific obligations for production, operation and use units of special equipment in the event of a recall, and refines the relevant provisions of the upper-level law to ensure that the recall system is implemented during the whole process of production, operation and use of special equipment.
  

Environment

1. < Law of PRC on Prevention and Control of Pollution from Environmental Noise > (2018-12-29)

Amendment decision on Law of PRC on Prevention and Control of Pollution from Environmental Noise has been adopted and gazetted at the seventh Meeting of the Standing Committee of the thirteen National People’s Congress on 29th December 2018, and has come into force upon promulgation. The main revised contents are as follows:

• Before a construction project is put into production or use, “The environmental noise pollution prevention and control facilities must be inspected by the competent administrative department for environmental protection that originally approved the environmental impact statement” is revised as “ the Construction Entity shall  carry out the Environmental Protection Acceptance Check for its environmental noise pollution prevention and control facilities according to the state-stipulated procedures and standards. ”
  
• The responsibility subject of Environmental Protection Acceptance Check is changed from “the competent administrative department for environmental protection” to “the Construction Entity”.
  

2. < Law of PRC on Environmental Impact Assessment > (2018-12-29)

Amendment decision on Law of PRC on Environmental Impact Assessment has been adopted and gazetted at the seventh Meeting of the Standing Committee of the thirteenth National People’s Congress on 29th December, 2018, and has come into force upon promulgation. After revised, the main contents are as follow:

• The Construction Entity may commission a technical agency to carry out environmental impact assessment, to prepare environmental impact statement or environmental impact report form for its construction project; The Construction Entity may carry out environmental impact assessment, prepare environmental impact statement or environmental impact report form by itself if it is competent for environmental impact assessment.
  
• The Construction Entity shall be responsible for the content and conclusion of environmental impact statement and environmental impact assessment report form. And the commissioned technical agency should assume corresponding responsibility for the environmental impact statement and environmental impact assessment report form it prepared.
  
• Relevant illegal information of preparation agency, chief preparer and principal preparation team member should be registered into social integrity file by the administrative department of ecology and environment that approved the environmental impact statement or environmental impact report form, and be integrated into state credit information sharing platform and national enterprise credit information publicity system and announced to public.
  

3. < Measures for Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessment > (2019-01-01)

The Measures for Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessment (hereinafter referred to as the Measure) has been adopted and gazatted by the Ministry of Ecological Environment on 16th July 2018, and has come into force on 1st January, 2019. Comparing to Interim Measures for Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessment (2006), the main changes are as follow:

• The subject responsibility of the construction unit is defined more clearly, the construction unit is responsible for the authenticity and results of the organizing and implementation of the Public Participation.
  
• Three main ways of information disclosure such as networks, newspapers and posting announcements have been refined.
• The role of public opinion is clarified and the way of public opinion investigation is optimized, the way of feedback for public opinion adopted or not is established, and disciplinary measures against fraud to ensure the effectiveness and authenticity of public participation is provided.
  
• The details of participation procedure is optimized, and public participation is classified for implementation.
  
• Public participation in environmental impact assessment approving by the administrative department for ecology and environment is defined clearly.
  

For facilitating the implementation of public participation, according to the relevant provision of the Measure, two supportive documents including Public Opinion Form for Construction Project Environmental Impact Assessment and Format Requirement on Specification of Public Participation in Environmental Impact Assessment were gazetted by the Ministry of Ecology and Environment on 12th October 2018 and have come into force together with the Measure.

Supplement

In addition, 12 laws or regulations, such as the Labour Law of the People’s Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Labour Law), the Food Safety Law of the People’s Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Food Safety Law) and the Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Prevention and Control of Occupational Diseases (hereinafter referred to as the Law on the Prevention and Control of Occupational Diseases)  were also adopted at the seventh meeting of the Standing Committee of the thirteenth National People’s Congress on 29th December 2018, and has come into force upon promulgation.

• The revision of the Labour Law is mainly embodied in: the professional appraisal institution was revised from the previous "government approval" to "recording"; the department revoking of the business license was revised from the "industrial and commercial administrative department" to the "market supervision and management department".
• The main change in the revision of the Food Safety Law is that the function of medical products administration and quality supervision and management are removed from the Food Safety Law.
  
• The main change in the revision of the Law on the Prevention and Control of Occupational Diseases is that the “safety production supervision and administration department” for some of the provisions are removed or amended to “Health Administration Department” instead.
  

The revision of the competent authorities of these regulations is in line with the reform of the national ministries and makes the corresponding authorities clearer.

China Minimum Wage Standard Update - January 2019

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