The “Measures for the Promotion of Enterprise Standardization” will come into force on 1 Jan. 2024

In recent years, the administrative function has gradually changed from pre-supervision to post-supervision in China. The administrative supervision regarding enterprise standardization is no exception. The “Measures for the Promotion of Enterprise Standardization” (hereinafter referred to as the “New Measures”) will come into force on 1 Jan. 2024, which will replace the “Administrative Measures on Enterprise Standardization”. The following is a brief introduction to the main contents of the “New Measures”.

Q1: Whether an enterprise must formulate its enterprise standards?

A1: It depends. According to Article 7 of the “New Measures”, if enterprise uses mandatory standards, recommended standards, without adding its own standards, in its products\service, then it does not have to formulate its enterprise standards. However, if there are no mandatory standards or recommended standards, enterprise standards should be formulated. It should be noted that if there are only industry standards, the enterprise should still formulate its own standards, because only mandatory standards and recommended standards can be directly referenced.

Q2: What are the requirements for the formulation methods of enterprise standards?

A2: The enterprise standards shall be formulated by experiment, inspection or evaluation. According to Article 12 of the “New Measures”, the formulation methods of enterprise standards shall quote from the corresponding national standards, industry standards or international standards; where there are no such corresponding standards, enterprises may formulate their own methods, which shall be scientific, reasonable, accurate and reliable.

Q3: What are the regulatory measures for enterprise standards?

A2: The regulatory measures change from supervision by filing to a system of self-declaration, publicity and supervision.

Article 14 of the “New Measures” stipulates: ” The State shall implement a system of self-declaration, publicity and supervision of enterprise standards. Enterprises shall make public the serial numbers and names of the mandatory standards, recommended standards, group standards or enterprise standards they implement in connection with the provision of products or services.   Where enterprises formulate standards by themselves or jointly formulate standards, they shall disclose to the public functional indexes of products and services, performance indexes of products and corresponding experiment methods, inspection methods or evaluation methods. Where laws, regulations or mandatory national standards provide otherwise for the restriction of excessive product packaging, enterprises shall disclose the standards for packaging they adopt in accordance with such provisions. Where the functional indexes and performance indexes disclosed by enterprises are lower or lower than recommended standards, enterprises shall explicitly indicate so in the disclosure of self-declaration.”

Q4: What are the requirements for the disclosure time of enterprise standards?

A4: According to the “Administrative Measures on Enterprise Standardization”, enterprises shall fill its enterprise within 30 days from the date of publication. After the implementation of the “New Measures”, enterprises should prior to providing products or services, complete the disclosure of self-declaration of information on implementation of standards.