. /.  WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION   
G/SCM/N/232 
20 October 2011 
 (11-5226) 
Committee on Subsidies  
and Countervailing Measures  Original:   English 
 
  
TRANSITIONAL REVIEW MECHANISM PURSUANT TO  
PARAGRAPH 18 OF THE PROTOCOL ON THE ACCESSION  
OF THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA 
 
Information provided by China pursuant to Annex 1A of the  
Protocol on the Accession of the People's Republic of China 
 
 
 The following communication, dated 20 October 2011, is being circulated at the request of 
the Delegation of China.  
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 II. E
CONOMIC POLICIES  
 4.  Pricing Policies   
(a)  Application of existing or any other price controls and the reason for their use  
 
 The practice of multiple pricing for one product or service in China has been terminated for 
many years.  Currently, prices of most products and services in China are market prices, and only a very small number of products and services are subject to government pricing or government 
guidance pricing.  These products and services subject  to pricing administration are published in the 
pricing catalogues of either the central government or  the local governments at the provincial level, 
and the pricing administration is regardless of the ownership of the enterprises or whether the 
products are domestic or imported,  consistent with the China's Accession Protocol, including its 
Annex 4.  Lists of these products and services subject to pricing administration, together with their 
related price-setting mechanism are available at China Economic Herald  and the official website of 
the National Development and Reform Commission (www.ndrc.gov.cn).  
 
 Since the accession to the WTO in 2001, China has continued its reform of the pricing 
mechanism. To name a few, in October 2001, the pr ices of lamp kerosene, light and heavy oils were 
liberalized to be market prices from the previous g overnment pricing or government guidance pricing. 
In 2004, National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the Civil Aviation 
Administration of China (CAAC) jointly promulgated the Reform Program of Domestic Air Transport 
Prices in Civil Aviation (NDRC and CAAC Announcement No. 18 of  2004) and changed domestic air 
transport prices to government guidance pricing from the previous government pricing as from 
20 April 2004.  Since 2005, China has also liberalized gradually the pricing administration in the 
telecom sector, and has change d charges for long-distance telephone calls, local fixed telephone 
services and certain mobile telephone services fro m government pricing to government guidance 
pricing.  In January 2009, NDRC and Ministry of Finance (MOF) jointly issued  Circular on the 
Reform of Pricing Mechanism of Fertilizers  (NDRC Circular Fa Gai Jia Ge No. 268 of 2009), G/SCM/N/232 
Page 2  
 
  announcing that prices of fertilizers such as urea wh ich had been subject to pricing administration 
were liberalized and would all be determined by the market.  (b) Pricing mechanism of China's state trading enterprises for export products  
 
 There are no price control measures or pricing mechanism in China now applying to state 
trading enterprises.  The prices of the products exported by state trading enterprises are independently determined by the enterprises them selves according to market conditions including the situation of 
demand and supply, the cost of production, processi ng and/or procurement as well as distribution etc. 
(i.e. cost of storage, transportation, interest rate and inspection fees etc.).  
 
 
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