An employee works on a surgical face mask production line. The prime minister has approved a proposal to ease the licensing rule for surgical face mask exports

The Government on April 29 issued Resolution 60 on the export of surgical face masks while Covid-19 infection prevention and control measures are in place, the local media reported.

Under the resolution, the licensing regulation for face mask exports in the Government’s Resolution 20 issued on February 28 will be eliminated.

Given the development of Covid-19---the disease caused by the coronavirus---and the domestic demand for surgical face masks, the Ministry of Health was told to make a report for the prime minister to decide on suitable measures for the management of face masks and ensure an adequate supply for the local market.

The prime minister assigned the Ministry of Industry and Trade to publicize the list of face mask producers and their production capacity, while the Ministry of Finance was tasked with making the volume of surgical face mask exports public.

Besides this, the Ministry of Industry and Trade was told to tighten control over the quality of face masks and to impose strict sanctions on those caught violating hoarding and price gouging regulations.

The nation’s cities and provinces were asked to direct their Departments of Health and other relevant agencies to regularly check face mask production facilities to ensure that their quality meets requirements.

Apart from this, the prime minister asked face mask exporters to assume responsibility for the quality of face masks and commit to selling them to health care centers when requested.

Earlier, the Government issued Resolution 20 regulating that the Ministry of Health apply the regulation on granting licenses for surgical face mask exports while Covid-19 infection prevention and control efforts are underway.

This resolution only allows surgical face masks to be exported for the purpose of support from the Government, while the export volume is limited to 25% of production. The remaining 75% of production must serve domestic consumption.SGT