Streamlining administration and delegating power to lower-level governments is an important part of the administrative system reform, which is set to improve modern governance and market economy system.

Over more than three years, the State Council has canceled or delegated 618 administrative approvals, and local governments have taken measures to implement the reform.

The numbers are only one part of the story, as the quality of the reform is what matters, especially for the ongoing supply-side structural reform, which will shake up the market currently facing overcapacity.

Business system reform, a major part of the streamlining and delegating reform, is providing optimized administrative services and simplified procedures to establish companies.

For example, in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, the local government streamlined and delegated 150 items of administrative approvals and abolished non-administrative approvals a year ago.

“Perfect as it is, the reform saves a huge amount of time and money for enterprises and reduces trouble in application material preparation, which helps enterprises improve efficiency,” said a businessman who was getting a business license in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.

But reform is not an easy job because implementation of policy measures involves many government departments.

Local government, such as the government of Heping district in northeast Shenyang city, knows this all too well. With much effort, the nation’s first administrative approval and service bureau that manages all businesses approval items such as enterprise registration and food and drug administration was established after 250 administrative approval items from 16 local government departments were transferred to the bureau.

Shenyang is not unique, as many local governments across the nation are making efforts to implement the reform.

Their efforts paid off. According to data, from January to April this year, Hainan province saw an increase of 30,303 market entities and 105.9 billion yuan ($16.1 billion) in registered capital, a growth rate of 8.11 percent and 31.76 percent, respectively.

The reform will continue, and more efforts are needed to further promote entrepreneurship and innovation and cultivate new driving forces.

As the governor of Hainan province noted, streamlining administration and delegating power to lower-level governments is not “a game of numbers”. Practical actions should be taken, and quality of the streamlining and delegating reform should be further improved to offer the most convenient services to the people.