• Six departments including the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, jointly issued the Special Labor Protection System for Female Employees in Workplaces (Reference Text) and the System for the Elimination of Sexual Harassment in Workplaces (Reference Text), aims to guide employers to improve internal rules and regulations, promote the detailed implementation in workplace of the relevant laws and regulations on the protection of women's rights and interests, to effectively protect the legitimate rights and interests of female employees.
• Guangdong Provincial Department of Human Resources and Social Security and Guangdong Provincial Health Commission jointly issued the Notice on Further Implementing the Leaves Related to the Regulations on Population and Family Planning of Guangdong Province to implement the relevant leave regulations such as parental leave and nursing leave.
• The Measure for the Administration of Quality Testing of Construction Projects, was issued by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development of PRC, aims to further strengthen the management of quality testing of construction projects and ensure the quality of construction projects.
• The Standards for Drinking Water Quality is an important basis for carrying out supervision and management of drinking water quality, and plays an important role in improving the quality of drinking water and ensuring the safety of drinking water quality in China.
• In order to better meet the current environmental management requirements and improve the standardization and information management level of hazardous waste identification signs, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment has issued the Technical specification for the setting of hazardous waste identification signs.
• Updated Minimum Wage Standard of Shanxi Province, Qinghai Province and Anhui Province.

Labour

< Notice on Issuing the < Special Labor Protection System for Female Employees in Workplaces (Reference Text) > and the < System for Eliminating Sexual Harassment in Workplaces (Reference Text) > >

< Notice on Further Implementing the Leaves Related to the Regulations of Guangdong Province on Population and Family Planning >

Health and Safety

< Measure for the Administration of Quality Testing of Construction Projects >

< Standards for Drinking Water Quality > GB5749-2022

Environment

< Technical specification for the setting of hazardous waste identification signs >

Minimum Wage Standard Update

Shanxi Province, Qinghai Province and Anhui Province

Labour

1. < Notice on Issuing the < Special Labor Protection System for Female Employees in Workplaces (Reference Text) > and the < System for Eliminating Sexual Harassment in Workplaces (Reference Text) > > (2023-03-08)

The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, the National Health Commission and other four departments jointly issued the Special Labor Protection System for Female Employees in Workplaces (Reference Text) and the System for the Elimination of Sexual Harassment in Workplaces (Reference Text) on 8^th March 2023, the main contents are as follows.

There are 26 articles in the Special Labor Protection System for Female Employees in Workplaces (Reference Text), which enumerates the labor and employment protection, wage and welfare protection, maternity protection, occupational safety and health protection, and other contents of female employees in workplaces. In addition, in order to ensure normal production order in workplaces, the text also provides normative guidance on the implementation process.

The System for Eliminating Sexual Harassment in Workplaces (Reference Text) has 20 articles, respectively clarifies the definition of sexual harassment and its main performance behaviors, public commitments, publicity and training, employee reporting and complaints, investigation and handling, and labor union participation and supervision. At the same time, the text also instructs employers to keep confidential for informants and complainants, the investigation and disposal work, requires paying attention to protecting personal privacy rights, and to avoid causing secondary harm to victims by taking measures such as adjusting work positions.

2. < Notice on Further Implementing the Relevant Leaves Related to the Regulations of Guangdong Province on Population and Family Planning > (2023-01-11)

Guangdong Provincial Department of Human Resources and Social Security and Guangdong Provincial Health Commission jointly issued the Notice on Further Implementing the Relevant Leaves Related to the Regulations on Population and Family Planning of Guangdong Province (hereinafter referred to as the Notice) on 11^th January 2023, proposing implementation opinions for the newly revised Regulations on Population and Family Planning of Guangdong Province (hereinafter referred to as the Regulations), clarifying the issues of leave application and treatment for leaves such as incentive leave, paternity leave, parental leave, and nursing leave.

• Wages for relevant leaves
  The 80-day incentive leave for women and the 15-day paternity leave for men as stipulated by Regulations, will be paid as usual, without affecting the welfare benefits and full attendance evaluation.
  At the same time, for the wage treatment during parental leave and nursing leave as stipulated by Regulations, employers should improve the employment management rules and regulations, strengthen collective negotiation on wages, negotiate with employees to clarify the wage treatment during parental leave and nursing leave, and sign collective contracts.
  Encourage employers with conditions to pay wages for parental leave and nursing leave according to the wage standards for incentive leave and paternity leave; The wage treatment during parental leave and nursing leave shall not be lower than the local minimum wage standard.
• How to take parental leave and nursing leave
  The Notice comprehensively considers the rights and interests of employers and employees and clarifies the calculation methods and specific leave application issues for parental leave and nursing leave.
  Parental leave is calculated on an annual basis and nursing leave is calculated on a natural year. Both parental leave and nursing leave cannot be overlapped. In the same calculation year, they can be split up but in principle no more than two times.

Health and Safety

1. < Measure for the Administration of Quality Testing of Construction Projects > (2023-03-01)

The Measure for the Administration of Quality Testing of Construction Projects (hereinafter referred to as the Measure) was issued by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development of PRC on 29^th December 2022 and has come into force as of 1^st March 2023. The revised contents of Measure are as follows:

1. The Measure expanded the testing items related to structural safety and main use functions to test content, and further clarified the scope of application for the quality testing is related to activities in the construction of new, expanded and rebuilt buildings and municipal infrastructure projects, as well as their supervision and management.
2. The Measure expanded the types of testing market entities and strictly regulated testing behavior.
3. According to the practical needs of construction project quality testing activities, the Measure modified the qualification of testing institutions into comprehensive qualification and special qualification. The qualification certificates shall be electronic certificates, and the validity period shall be extended from 3 years to 5 years.
4. The Measure improved the supervision mechanism and increased the penalties. It strengthened the control of quality testing process of construction projects, stipulated that the competent department shall implement dynamic supervision on testing institutions, increased the supervision methods such as sampling testing, and increased penalties for violations of laws and regulations.

2. < Standards for Drinking Water Quality > GB5749-2022 (2023-04-01)

The Standards for Drinking Water Quality GB5749-2022 (hereinafter referred to as the New Standards) was jointly issued by the State Administration of Market Regulation and Standardization Administration on March 15, 2023, replacing the 2006 version of GB5749-2006 of the old standard, and will be implemented as of 1^st April 2023. The relevant revisions to the Standards are as follows.

1. The new Standards specifies the water quality indexes would be adjusted from 106 items in GB5749-2006 to 97 items, including 43 conventional indicators and 54 expanded indicators; The water quality reference indexes would be adjusted from 28 items in GB 5749-2006 to 55 items.
2. The new Standards pays more attention to sensory indexes, such as color, turbidity, odor, and taste, these indexes are closely related to the taste and comfort when drinking water.   
3. The new Standards pays more attention to disinfection by-products. The new Standards further adjusted the six disinfection by-product with high detection rate from unconventional indexes to conventional indexes include chlorodibromomethane, dichlorobromomethane, tribromomethane, trihalomethane, dichloroacetic acid and trichloroacetic acid, so as to strengthen the control of the above indexes. Also, considering that the concentration of ammonia (N) has a great impact on the dosage of disinfectants, it is adjusted from the unconventional index to the conventional index.
4. The new Standards pays more attention to risk changes, and adjusts indicators based on water source risk changes and recent work practices, which are reflected in "one increase and one decrease", for example, two expanded indexes were added and 12 indexes were removed.

Environment

1. < Technical specification for the setting of hazardous waste identification signs > (2023-07-01)

The Technical specification for the setting of hazardous waste identification signs (hereinafter referred to as the Specification) has been issued by the Ministry of Ecology and Environment on 30^th December 2022 and will come into force on 1^st July 2023.The main contents of the Specification are as follows:

1. The Specification divided the identification signs of hazardous waste into three main categories according to the different requirements for hazardous waste identification signs information in different environmental management links of hazardous waste collection, storage, utilization and disposal, as well as the different requirements for hazardous waste identification signs setting in various scenarios.

• Hazardous waste label is an identification sign posted on the container and packaging of hazardous waste, to warn and identify hazardous waste, as well as providing basic information about hazardous waste’s name, code, main constituent, hazardous property, production date, production entity, contact information.  can be a caution for operator in the activities of During the collecting, storing, utilizing, transporting and disposing of hazardous waste, hazardous waste labels can alert the operators to prevent improper operation from harming the ecological environment and human health.
• Hazardous waste storage subarea sign is the identification sign set in hazardous waste storage facility, marking the division of storage area and hazardous waste category information in each division in the form of plane distribution map, which is used to warn relevant personnel that hazardous waste should be stored according to the classification of hazardous waste characteristics.
• Signs of hazardous waste storage, utilization, disposal facility are the identification signs set in hazardous waste related facilities and site, consists of warning pictogram and auxiliary text. The warning pictogram is mainly used to communicate environmental hazard characteristics, the auxiliary text is mainly used to indicate information of type of hazardous facility and relevant responsible person, make it be easy to contact the responsible person timely in case of accident, and take preventive measures to avoid the spread of environmental risks as much as possible.

2. The Specification provided specified the requirements on filling, manufacturing methods and setting of hazardous waste identification signs.

• For the hazardous waste listed in the National Hazardous Waste Catalogue, identification signs could be filled in by referring to relevant content in the Specification, for the hazardous waste identified by identification standard, identification signs could be filled in with the corresponding information of waste name, category and code according to requirement of the Specification. For the information of waste main constituent, hazardous property, production, the entities produced/collected the waste should fill them in the identification signs according to the actual situation.
• The Specification provided the corresponding setting requirements for box packaging, bag packaging, and bucket packaging, the general principle of label setting is that they should be set in the conspicuous place of containers or packages.
• According to the volume size of hazardous waste containers or packages, the Specification provided the minimum size requirements for labels in different situations. Relevant entities could make labels according to the recommended size or enlarge them according to actual needs. In addition, the Specification provided specific requirement on the label color, font, material, printing, the relevant entities can make a unified style of labels accordingly.

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