The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security ("MOHRSS") has recently issued the Guiding Opinions on Deepening the Reform of the Professional Title System for Economic Professionals (the "Opinions").
The Opinions state that, through improving the institutional framework, optimizing the assessment criteria, innovating the assessment mechanism, ensuring an effective connection with the use of talent, and ramping up supervision and administration, a new professional title system oriented towards morality, capacity and business performance and focusing on acceptance by the general public and peers will take shape to cover various economic professionals. According to the Opinions, the assessment shall prioritize the professional ethics of economic professionals, and measures will be taken to improve the building of a credit system in favor of the professional title assessment for economic professionals; economic professionals with such misconduct as academic fraud, will be subject to the "veto system". Professional titles obtained by means of fraud, covert deals or otherwise in an inappropriate fashion, will be revoked. Meanwhile, the Opinions explicitly state that assessment methods will be further diversified, adding that junior and intermediate professional titles will be awarded via exams, instead of through assessment, to economic professionals, and previous corresponding professional title assessment or appraisal will no longer be conducted in the future, and that to win associate senior professional titles, economic professionals will not only take exams but also undergo the assessment, while senior professional titles will be generally granted via reviews.