The State Council started a nationwide inspection last month, with a focus on four key issues that challenge economic and social development in China: stabilizing the economy, promoting supply-side reform, boosting innovation-driven development and improving people’s wellbeing.

With an effort to be more efficient and authoritative, the inspection is adopting new methods to tackle heavy tasks and deal with the tight schedule.

Local regions and departments were asked to first carry out self-inspections and then send evaluation reports to the State Council before on-site inspections, which allows inspection groups to have a basic understanding of the major concerns in local areas.

The inspectors also hosted symposiums and group discussions with local representatives to hear and discuss concerns on any problems found during the policy implementation and any issues related to local enterprises and governments. Local government staff members were not allowed to attend these meetings to allow representatives to enjoy an open discussion.

Instead of wasting time on redundant meetings this time, the inspection groups carried out more on-the-spot inspections, undercover inquiries, questionnaires and surveys to collect first-hand information.

The inspection has asked for average people’s suggestions in a section on the Chinese government official website. The section was established to collect netizens’ opinions on the inspection. As of Oct 24, it has collected 9,662 messages from netizens.

In addition, the inspection has more explicitly emphasized areas closely related to people’s wellbeing, including administrative reform as well as affordable house construction and management.