China’s State Council has cancelled all non-administrative reviews on Thursday in lieu of combatting red tapes and instilling market vitality.
The decision of the country's cabinet would entail the removal of 48 non-administrative reviews and the shifting of another 84 into an internal review category.
Signed by Premier Li Keqiang, the statement said: "As of today, the category of non-administrative review and approval no longer exists."
The central government aims to abolish all non-administrative reviews before the year ends.
"It goes without saying that powers should not be held without good reason," Premier Li noted.
The government's fight against red tape has been stepped up following slow growth and the intensified effort to transform the economy from an unsustainable paradigm into a private consumption- and services-driven one.
Holding non-administrative reviews has been a practice since 2004, a year after the country issued its Law on Administrative Approval.
Li Zhangze, spokesman for the group responsible for review items clearing, said that back then, only government internal reviews and approvals are included. For the following years, more items were added such as those involving tax breaks and local tourism.
Li added that the scheme gradually became an infamous avenue for corruption, citing that the processes involved were not strictly regulated and standardized.
The spokesman shared that any of the government departments could have a non-administrative review item by simply publishing an official document through the pretext touted as "internal procedures."
"In such circumstances, non-administrative reviews gradually became a 'grey zone' and a great number of items that came from these 'grey zones' did not comply with the Administrative Approval Law but had the nature of administrative reviews," he emphasized.
Sichuan University's Xu Jimin stated that such reviews can often be traced back to government agencies' "self-authorization."