The government moved to ease burdens on corporations by overhauling 251 hidden regulations at public institutions. Though not legal regulations, the intent is to revise internal rules and guidelines that effectively acted as constraints in the field to lower entry barriers and expense burdens for corporations.
On the 3rd, the government announced a plan to rationalize hidden regulations at public institutions affecting corporations on the ground at a joint meeting of the Emergency Economic Headquarters and the ministers in charge of economic affairs.
The initiative was jointly promoted by public institutions, the Ministry of Economy and Finance, and the Small and Medium Business Ombudsman. It was carried out to address problems where corporate activities were constrained by internal standards applied in public institutions' testing and certification, registration and reporting, and procurement and bidding processes. A total of 109 public institutions participated, resulting in 251 improvement tasks.
By category, there were 44 cases of entry regulations such as business and location; 39 cases of support for technology development and easing expense burdens; 123 cases of improving procurement and bidding methods; and 45 cases of streamlining work procedures.
Specifically, measures to lower corporations' entry burdens were included. The location regulations will be eased by relaxing installation standards for liquefied hydrogen charging facilities, and the point deductions for a history of "bankruptcy or workout" in selecting power equipment suppliers will be removed to expand market entry opportunities for corporations making a second attempt.
Measures to promote technology development and ease expense burdens will also be pursued. The beneficiaries of fee reductions for testing and inspection related to the water industry will be expanded from corporations in existing clusters to all small and mid-sized corporations, and some public institutions plan to use their own funds to support small corporations' artificial intelligence (AI) transition expense.
Improvements to procurement and transaction practices were also included. The scope of the delivery price indexation system will be expanded, and the defect repair deposit rate for manufacturing and purchasing goods will be lowered from 5% to 3%. The payment period for sales proceeds to corporations that have stores in public institutions will also be shortened from "settlement closing date +10 days" to "+2 days" to reduce cash flow burdens.
The government will have each public institution implement the tasks as quickly as possible through their internal procedures and plans to review implementation in the second half of 2026. In addition, with the Small and Medium Business Ombudsman at the center, the government will expand the Corporate Growth Response Center to continuously identify and improve on-site difficulties.