Zhou Qiang, president of the Supreme People’s Court (SPC), said during the eighth national civil and commercial trial working conference of the court on Dec 23, 2015 that courts at all levels should ensure fair trials involving civil and commercial cases to support the country’s healthy economic growth.

Zhou said that the civil and commercial cases are closely related to people’s lives and social and economic development, and therefore courts at all levels must ensure they decide such cases fairly to contribute to healthy social and economic development.

He said the court system has made much headway in improving the judiciary framework in recent years. For example, the SPC has established a special tribunal for environment and resource-related cases and is helping courts at lower levels to set up similar tribunals; special intellectual property right courts have been set up in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou; the concept of rule of law has been strengthened; a number of judiciary explanations have been released; and the handling of cases has become more standard and transparent, Zhou said.

Zhou said that in handling economic cases, the property rights of businesses and other entities should be protected, contract ethics should be respected and promoted, and the rights of owners should be equally protected regardless of the owners’ backgrounds. He also said that market entities should be encouraged to act honestly and to help to create a healthy market order.