The Ministry of Commerce ("MOFCOM") recently issued the Implementation Plan on Initiating the Pilot Program for the Full-coverage Reform of "Decoupling Business Licenses from Operating Permits" in Pilot Free Trade Zones (the "Plan"), and several other authorities, including the General Office of the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security ("MOHRSS"), the China Securities Regulatory Commission ("CSRC"), the State Administration of Foreign Exchange ("SAFE") and the State Administration for Market Regulation ("SAMR"), also released their counterpart documents respectively.

The Plan states that starting from December 1, 2019, 13 enterprise-related business items subject to operating permits, including record-filing of foreign trade operators, (preliminary) examination and approval for the business qualification for wholesaling finished oil products, and accreditation of the qualification for state trading of imports and exports, shall be reformed according to their category in all 18 pilot free trade zones including the Shanghai Pilot Free Trade Zone. For this purpose, four different approaches, namely, directly canceling the examination and approval process, replacing the examination and approval requirement with the record-filing requirement, practicing the notification and commitment mechanism, and optimizing the examination and approval services, shall be adopted accordingly.

(Source: Ministry of Commerce)