Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Monday, April 28, 2003
China's Ministry of Commerce Ensures Market Stability
The Ministry of Commerce Sunday urged local governments across the country to "do their best'' to ensure a stable market supply of commodities ranging from food and household goods to special epidemic prevention products.
China's Ministry of Commerce Sunday urged its national commerce branches to ensure abundant commodities and medical supplies on the market and set up a daily monitoring and reporting system.
The ministry made the remarks in notices issued Sunday to stop panic buying in some places of the country.
The ministry also required the national commerce sectors to be well prepared to distribute commodities and medical supplies such as masks and disinfectants.
Seven staple commodities listed by the ministry, as the targets of daily supervision are grains, oil, vegetables, meet, egg, salt, and sugar.
Each city should select at least 10 major markets or supermarkets for monitoring and report the sales and prices of the selected goods to local authorities every day, said the ministry. A 24-hour hotline has been set up within the ministry to deal with the timely distribution of supplies.
The ministry has also strengthened the national market regulation and any illegalities, like fake or low quality commodities and cases of improper price rises, will be exposed and punished.