Time for action
- By Lin Shaowen
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E-mail CRI, March 17, 2015
As NPC lawmakers have endorsed a series of development, budgetary and reforms programmes, chances are that similar measure seen in 2014 will continue, but in a more intensified manner, at a quicken pace, and comprehensively. Among all, the efforts to redefine the government role must be carried out in a pragmatic manner, down-to-earth. What to do or what not, to do more or less - that requires systematic and institutional efforts on a legal basis.
It so happened that the NPC session ended on March 15, World Consumer Rights Day. State television went live again to reveal shoddy goods and tracked down to the producers and supply lines. There were also awareness raising campaigns nationwide on how to tell fake goods and products of inferior quality. Many thanks, but the question is, do we have to learn the skills? Can we assume that all products allowed on sale are OK?
Yes, there are laws on manufacturing, transportation and marketing. There are regulations on enforcement, supervision and accountability. And there are administrations and mechanisms to deal with illegal behaviors. But are they fully working, to effectively protect consumer rights?
Only if those measures and mechanisms mean business. Personally I don't bother to learn to be an expert on various products. It's impossible. I would rather go to stores and markets with business licenses, resting assure that sub-quality and fakes are banned there and their producers and supply lines will be barred from business lifelong once revealed and convicted guilty. The government certainly has a lot to do to streamline the market. That also has to do with job-creation (to set up professional teams of law enforcers and supervisors). Manufacturers in China are already providing a sufficient amount of goods for the entire nation and have more for exports, but quality uplifting and market regulation must follow suit. Besides, that may also reduce the embarrassing cases of outbound tourists grabbing "made-in-China" outside China.
Faced with downward pressure, the government vowed to create new growth engines, and has found huge potentials in two aspects - popular entrepreneurship and innovation being one and providing public goods and services as the other.
Good choices, as the private sector provides more than 90 percent of jobs and e-commerce is gaining momentum. In their separate press conferences, the minister of commerce and that of the industry and information technology promised to create favorable conditions for micro-firms and provide legal and technical support. Such promises come at a time of need, as a record 7.5 million college graduates are expected to enter the job market and another 3 million rural migrants come to cities for jobs. Such efforts are a shot in the arm for the cabinet's 2015 job-generation target of another 10-million. But pragmatic action is needed, not only in law- and policy-making (simplified registration procedures), in mechanism building, but also capacity building (vocational training), which itself means job-absorbing.
Right, there should not be massive stimulus for industries already with over capacity. Again right, there should be proactive, targeted stimulus for "future business", possible new engines that mean jobs, income and social stability.
As for public goods and services, again we need forward-looking, not merely the amount and coverage, but also higher quality and standards, plus better regulation.
Take a look at emergency calls. Why should people dial different numbers for fire fighters, ambulances and police? Imagined a senior citizen or a toddler facing a gunman or robber with a knife and they have to strike the different keys of 1-1-0 and there is no time for a second try. Why not the same key three times and let professional sort out classification in a safer place? Better service means better accommodation. That may require more professions, meaning more jobs on offer, leading to greater social stability. That, too, needs steady progress, sometimes government entrepreneurship and innovation, other times, only simple things.
Mr. Lin Shaowen is strongly interested in international relations and Chinese politics. As China is quite often misunderstood in the rest of the world, he feels the need to better present the true picture of the country, the policies and meanings. So he talks a lot and is often seen debating. Then friends find a critical Lin Shaowen criticizing and criticized.
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