On March 15th, the Fifth Session of the Twelfth National People’s Congress held a closing ceremony at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. 2017 marked the fifth year of Wu Xiangdong, chairman of Jindong Group, being a deputy to the NPC National People’s Congress. Over the five years as the NPC deputy, Wu Xiangdong has extensively and deeply understood the sentiment and opinions of the people, paid attention to the hot issues, difficulties and views of the public, and submitted important suggestions and proposals to the NPC for five consecutive years. His proposals involve food safety, business environment, national mental health, fireworks safety, supervision over import and smuggling of zombie meat, supervision over long-distance transport of black powder, and amendments to laws and regulations.

 

Proposal 1: Relying on Power of Whole Society to Solve Food Safety Problems

Specific suggestion: strengthen food safety legislation and food safety law amendment. The people’s congresses at all levels and their standing committees should, based on the Food Safety Law, further improve the relevant supporting regulations and increase the intensity of punishment on food safety incidents. Strengthen the supervision of environmental sources. Environmental sources should not be ignored for food safety supervision, because any polluted water, soil and other raw materials are likely to cause food safety hazards.

 

Proposal 2: Nine Suggestions to Call for Strengthened Food Safety Management in China

Specific suggestions:

1. The CPC Central Committee and the State Council should put comprehensive management of food safety as the top priority;

2. Implement the “jurisdiction responsibility system” for food production and processing enterprises and small workshops;

3. Strengthen the food safety legislation and food safety law amendment, and the public security and other departments should set up special investigation and detection agencies;

4. Strengthen the supervision of environmental sources;

5. Increase the financial investment in food safety testing equipment and make overall arrangements;

6. Strengthen the guidance of public opinion on food safety incidents;

7. Strengthen the popularization of food safety knowledge and food safety laws;

8. Focus on increasing the access threshold of food production and processing enterprises;

9. Strengthen the construction of food production enterprises and agricultural information database.

 

Proposal 1: Raise Awareness of Importance of Rural Food Safety

Proposal 2: Crack Down on Protective Umbrella for Counterfeiting and Selling Fake Products

Proposal 3: Modify and Improve Standards about Food Additives and Heavy Metal Content in China

 

Proposal: Proposal on Perfecting Criminal Punishment for Harming Food and Drug Safety Crimes

Suggestion on the law erection: Production and selling of counterfeit drugs, inferior drugs, fake and shoddy food should constitute a crime and the public security organ has the right to investigate and take coercive measures against such action; at the same time, the intensity of property punishment should be increased and the market limited access system should be introduced to prevent offenders who constitute a crime from entering the field of food and drug production and sales for good.

 

Proposal 1: Proposal for Relevant Government Departments to Prioritize Availability of Fund to Eliminate Backward Production Capacity of High-risk Industries and Promote Safety Development of Fireworks and Firecrackers

Specific suggestions:

1. Optimize the industry layout;

2. Guide the enterprises in non-dominant areas for orderly exit;

3. Close enterprises that do not have safety conditions;

4. Support the exiting enterprises in transformation.

 

Poposal 2: Recommendations on Promotion of National Mental Health

Specific suggestions:

1. The State should consider amending the Mental Health Act and substantially increase the content relating to mental health in the Act;

2. Improve the quality of psychological professional education and the development of basic psychology and applied psychology, encourage more high-quality young people to be devoted to this career of great social value;

3. Increase the publicity of mental health;

4. Include “psychotherapy” into the coverage of health insurance.

 

Proposal 1: Suggestion on Continuously Intensifying Fight against Smuggling of Imported Zombie Meat

Specific suggestions:

1. Strengthen the crackdown intensity and resolutely curb zombie meat smuggling;

2. Increase the support for beef cattle breeding and reduce the cost of beef production through economies of scale;

3. Strengthen the construction of traceability information system and regulate the supervision over domestic beef market circulation and quality;

4. Improve the education on food safety laws and publicity of domestic quality beef brands.

 

Proposal 2: Suggestion on Strengthening Regulation on Long-distance Transport of Black Powder and Firing Lines

Specific suggestions:

1. Continue to strengthen the regulation on the transport of black powder;

2. Continue to push fireworks enterprises to gather in the main producing areas;

3. Further improve the upstream industrial chains in Hunan and Jiangxi as two main producing areas.

 

Proposal 3: Suggestion on Strengthening Safety Supervision of Agricultural Products and VegetablesSpecific suggestions:

Specific suggestions:

1. Improve the food safety supervision system;

2. Increase the investment in upgrading the vegetable detection technology;

3. Strengthen the publicity and education on vegetable and food safety;

4. Exploit the demonstration and radiating role of leading enterprises and bases of agricultural products.