Lawyer Qiao Zhanxiang, a learned proponent of China's pricing hearing system, had good reason to feel vindicated as a national pricing hearing on air tickets was organized in Beijing yesterday.

Beijing-based Qiao, 40, and originally from North China's Hebei Province, was dubbed "a decisive contributor" to the country's current structure for hearing systems by deputy secretary-general of the State Council Wang Yang.

The first public hearing in China took place in January 2002, after Qiao brought the Ministry of Railways to court in 2001 after prices for train travel were jacked up during the Spring Festival holiday period of 1999.

Qiao alleged the ministry's price increase had violated the Pricing Law, because no public hearings were held before it made the decision.

The court in turn ruled that the Pricing Law does require hearings before government-guided prices can be set on key public utilities.

But detailed rules for such hearings were not worked out by the State Development Planning Commission (SDPC) until August 2001, almost six months after the price hike.

Starting from August 1, 2001, a public hearing must be held before relevant authorities can decide the prices of critical services and products under the government's control, according to a regulation unveiled by the SDPC.

The public and news media have been granted free access to the pricing decision process.

Now, only 13 commodity and service items of special importance to people's lives and national securities remain under the jurisdiction of the State Council's pricing authorities and related departments. And service providers are free to name prices on the other commodities and services.

The 13 products, including the State's reserved grains, certain fertilizers, important medicines, natural gas, water supply, power, and postal and telecommunication services.

During the process, applicants must present pricing plans and attached explanations of these costs to consumer representatives, pricing authorities and experts. The representatives have the right to view the final records of the hearings.

In establishing a market-oriented system, pricing authorities should focus their attention on market regulation and act as a watchdog of market players, said the official

(HK Edition 07/16/2003 page2)