The agency investigated numerous cases of restriction of competition and analyzed thousands of local measures related to competition policy.
Market regulators in China's Gansu Province kept a sharp focus on abuses of administrative power in the first half of 2025, investigating multiple cases that restricted competition and reviewing thousands of local policy measures, as the province aligns with Beijing’s push for a unified national market.
From January to June, the provincial arm of the State Administration for Market Regulation, or SAMR, reviewed 4,157 policy measures and amended 223, the local regulator said on its official social-network account.
It also completed third-party assessments in 44 counties and districts, and scrapped 268 documents that hindered fair competition, as part of its ongoing implementation of the country's fair-competition review mechanism, which was launched in 2016.
Notably, five formal investigations into abuses of administrative power to exclude or restrict competition were launched in the first half of 2025, in parallel with a campaign targeting conduct that disrupts market order or undermines fair rivalry.
By comparison, the province formally opened four such cases in all of 2024, while nationally, market regulators opened 72 that year, underscoring that Gansu’s pace in 2025 is on the higher end.
According to SAMR’s 2024 annual work report, the province examined eight suspected cases of abuse of administrative power in sectors including bike sharing, kitchen-waste disposal and health checks in that year. Four were formally opened for investigation, while six were corrected.
The province’s work on fighting administrative monopolies also fits into the country's broader push to tackle self-defeating competition, known in China as “involution,” with SAMR identifying seven types of misconduct that fuel it, from unfair pricing to improper government interference.
Gansu’s market watchdog says it will step up the collection and verification of leads in the second half of the year, refine enforcement rules and expand advocacy on fair-competition policies to government bodies, party schools and enterprises. The aim, it said, is to help “contribute to building a unified national market.”
China’s Fair Competition Review Regulations permit exceptions only in narrow circumstances — such as safeguarding national security, promoting technological progress, pursuing public-interest goals such as environmental protection, or other situations defined in law — and only when no less-restrictive alternative exists and a clear time limit or termination condition is set.
Source: MLex
