‘Maker’ goes viral thanks to administrative reform

2018-07-21
english.gov.cn

Premier Li Keqiang visits Chaihuo Makerspace in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, on Jan 4, 2015.

Premier Li Keqiang visits Chaihuo Makerspace in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, on Jan 4, 2015.

Premier Li Keqiang’s photo of holding “Maker’s passport” in hand is on the wall of Chaihuo Makerspace, a maker hub situated in Shenzhen,  South China’s Guangdong province.

The photo was taken on Jan 4, 2015, during Premier Li’s inspection tour. And on that day he agreed to be an honorable member of Chaihuo Makerspace and accepted the “Maker’s passport”, the membership card.

“Ok, I’d like to add a piece of firewood to your business, to advocate more people to be makers!” the Premier said.

Data shows the firewood has a bright blaze. At present, there are more than 100 million market entities in China, over 31 million of which are enterprises, and the number is growing with individually owned businesses developing into companies.

Premier Li said it is the administrative reform that ignites market vitality, providing a buttress for economic growth and employment.

The Chinese word “Chuangke”, translated from the English word “maker”, has become a hot word due to the Premier’s “firewood”. It refers to those who love to transform their extraordinary ideas into actual products with new technologies.

By the end of 2015, “Chuangke” was voted as a top 10 buzzword in China.

As founder of Chaihuo Makerspace, Pan Hao has experienced the convenience brought by the administrative reform.

When he first started business in 2008, he had to go to the industrial and commercial bureau, the tax bureau, banks and other institutions to get business registration. “It was too complicated, so we had to run the company without certificates for half a year,” Pan said, “but now it’s very quick to register a company.”

Premier Li Keqiang addresses a teleconference on the issues of streamlining administrative approvals, delegating power to lower levels and improving regulations and services in Beijing, June 28, 2018.

Premier Li Keqiang addresses a teleconference on the issues of streamlining administrative approvals, delegating power to lower levels and improving regulations and services in Beijing, June 28, 2018.

Premier Li stressed the key role of shortening the registration period for enterprises in creating an easy business environment.

Although the registration period has been largely shortened to 22.9 days from 33 since business system reform began, it should be cut further according to international standards, Premier Li added.

He urged related departments to ensure that starting a business will take less than 8.5 days by the first half of 2019 and 5 days within five years, through measures such as streamlining process in business, tax and social insurance registration, and opening bank accounts by filing instead of approvals.

To tackle the time-consuming process of obtaining permits faced by licensed enterprises, China will carry out a pilot reform of separating business licenses from operation permits, with focus on removing permits for licensed ones through cutting approvals or replacing it to filing. And for those not qualified temporarily, related departments should optimize service through measures such as “integrating multiple permits into one”, said Premier Li.

According to the Premier, stimulated by streamlining administration and delegating powers, related departments should further deepen business system reform and investment project approval reform while vigorously removing market access threshold and pushing forward tax and fee reduction.

He said final results of such reforms should only be evaluated by market entities and people.

Chaihuo Makerspace visited by Premier Li in 2015 is one of the examples that benefited from the administrative reform. Its scale of operation has increased threefold, with office space expanding from 60 square meters to 2,000. And their business now has already extended to over 20 countries and regions.