Officials from the Ministry of Commerce said moves to promote a business credit guarantee mechanism and the crackdown on wrongdoing will help maintain the country’s ongoing efforts to upgrade consumption and establish a new nationwide regulatory system with credit as the core this year.

Their remarks came after the Ministry of Commerce issued a guideline to promote the development of business credit in December, in response to the central government’s call to improve social credit systems nationwide in an integrated manner.

Zong Changqing, director-general at the ministry’s department of market supervision, said the government will build a new type of regulatory mechanism based on credit supervision, and actively build an information traceability system covering e-commerce platforms, foreign trade, rural markets and modern supply chains this year.

“The ministry will continue to work with related government branches to crack down on counterfeit and low-quality food, and prepaid shopping card sales in rural areas to constantly standardize business practices and optimize the consumer environment in both rural areas and lower-tier cities in 2019,” he said.

Numerous Chinese government bodies, including the Ministry of Commerce and the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, jointly launched a nationwide campaign to crack down on substandard and counterfeit food products in rural areas last December.

The operation aims to effectively address six types of major crimes before the Chinese Lunar New Year, which falls on Feb 5.

Law enforcement agencies will target instant food, snacks, alcohol and condiments, as well as dairy and meat products in rural areas, while fake label information, knockoffs and substandard products are highlights on the campaign agenda.

The government plans to leave no stone unturned in tracking useful tips to bust as many illegal factories and workshops as possible. Those found responsible for related crimes will receive industry access bans and be transferred to the police if necessary, said Wang Bin, deputy director-general at the ministry’s department of market system development.

The government will also build a new batch of urban and rural consumer service centers to enhance the supply of quality services and improve the level of service standardization in key areas such as housekeeping and catering this year, according to the Ministry of Commerce.

“We will speed up the construction of the credit system in the housekeeping industry, and promote the quality expansion of the modern service sector,” said Wang.

The guideline has provided the basic principles and overall objectives of business credit development and required promoting the implementation of the whole process of credit supervision in the field of commerce over the next several years, said Xian Guoyi, director-general of the Department of Trade in Service and Commercial Services at the Ministry of Commerce.

He said the document has also clarified the key points of credit development in areas including housekeeping service, e-commerce, wholesale and retail, and pointed out the main tasks for improving China’s integrity business environment in foreign trade, trade in services, foreign investment, foreign economic cooperation and regional credit system development in 2019.