The General Office of the State Council issued a guideline to support college students in innovation and starting businesses, according to a document released on Oct 12.

The guideline stressed more efforts to enhance college students’ capability in innovation and entrepreneurship by improving relevant education systems in colleges and universities, enhancing teacher's ability, and strengthening training for students.

Authorities should lower the threshold for starting businesses for college students by offering efficient and convenient registration services, and encouraging incubators to provide a certain percent of incubation space free to college students’ start-up teams.

Services for technological innovation will be improved and guaranteeing policies will be in place to help those failing to start a business.

On-campus innovation and entrepreneurship practice platforms are encouraged to offer college students incubation services for free and demonstration bases for mass entrepreneurship and innovation should take a leading role, according to the guideline.

The guideline also highlighted governments’ fiscal and tax support for mass entrepreneurship and innovation. In the future, colleges and universities will receive more funds in mass entrepreneurship and innovation, and policies to reduce taxes and fees will be implemented in detail for start-ups.

Inclusive financial policies will be implemented, the guideline said, noting that the maximum limit of personal loans for college graduates will be raised to 200,000 yuan and the maximum loan limit for eligible small and micro businesses set up by college graduates will be raised to 3 million yuan. Social capital also will be guided to support college students to start businesses.

Organizations and long-term mechanisms should be established to serve college students in commercializing their achievements in innovation and entrepreneurship, and information platforms should be improved to offer better information services for college students, according to the guideline.

It stressed that the China International College Students' "Internet Plus" Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition should be well-organized.