China has reduced several pension and insurance fees in order to help businesses cope with the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.
According to a report by Reuters, businesses in Hubei Province, the outbreak’s epicentre, will be exempt from paying pension contributions, unemployment insurance, and workplace injury insurance premiums until June.
Small businesses in other provinces will also be included in the exemption, the report added. Large businesses will have these fees halved until April, according to an announcement by China’s cabinet on state television.
Furthermore, companies can apply before end-June to postpone payments to the state-run housing provident fund. Loans to the provident fund that are unpaid because of the virus outbreak will not be considered overdue, the government said.
The cabinet urged local governments to make sure that migrant workers are able to return to their workplaces if those areas are not seriously hit by COVID-19. Beijing has also moved to maintain food security amid the outbreak. It has frozen the prices of rice for the year, and it is ramping up pork production as well as increasing the size of its frozen pork reserves.
