Guidelines for Charitable Organizations and the Red Cross Lawful and Regulated Carrying Out of Charitable Fundraising Activities for Epidemic Prevention and Control

Promulgation Date: 2020-2-14
Title: Guidelines for Charitable Organizations and the Red Cross Lawful and Regulated Carrying Out of Charitable Fundraising Activities for Epidemic Prevention and Control
Document Number:
Expiration date: 
Promulgating Entities: Ministry of Civil Affairs
Source of text: http://www.mca.gov.cn/article/xw/tzgg/202002/20200200024510.shtml

Since the occurrence of the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic, the broad community of charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association have actively responded to the Central Party Commission's call to orderly participate in epidemic control and prevention efforts, becoming an important force for combating the epidemic. In order to further lawfully regulate charitable organizations' and the Red Cross Association's carrying out of charitable fundraising activities (hereinafter fundraising activities) and other activities in support or epidemic prevention and control efforts, the following guidelines on related matters are hereby published:

I. Charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association shall strictly follow the "P.R.C. Charity Law", "P.R.C. Law on the Red Cross Association", "P.R.C. Public Interest Donations Law", "P.R.C. Emergency Respons Law", "Measures on the Administration of Public Fundraising by Charitable Organizations", and the "Measures on Information Disclosures by Charitable Organizations" and other laws and regulations, to lawfully and regularly carry out fundraising and other such activities.

II. Charitable organizations that have lawfully obtained public fundraising credentials, and the Red Cross Association, may carry out fundraising activities aimed at the public. Organizations and individuals that do not have public fundraising credentials may cooperate with charitable organizations that do have public fundraising credentials, or the Red Cross Association, to carry out public fundraising, and the charitable organization with public fundraising credentials or the Red Cross Association is to manage the funds. Fundraising activities are to uphold the voluntariness principle, and must not have assigned amounts or covertly assigned amounts.

III. Charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association shall report a fundraising plan for filing with the Ministry of Civil Affairs 10 days before launching public fundraising activities. Where due to urgent circumstances it is not possible to record a fundraising plan before carrying out public fundraising activities, the recording formalities shall be completed within 10 days of initiating the public fundraising activities.

IV. Where charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association use online methods to carry out public fundraising, they shall publish information on the fundraising on the online information platform for public fundraising information designated by the Ministry of Civil Affairs, and may simultaneously publish public fundraising information on online platforms opened in the organization's name such as websites, official microblogs, official WeChat, and mobile client terminals.

V. Charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association shall reasonably allot use of donated funds and materials in accordance with the requirements of the overall national plan for epidemic prevention and control, under the uniform leadership and deployments of each local joint prevention and control mechanism, based on the actual needs of epidemic prevention and control efforts, and fully respecting and embodying the wishes of donors. Except for designated donations, emphasize support of Hubei Province, especially Wuhan City and other regions where the epidemic is serious.

VI. Charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association are to accelerate their work pace and establish fast and convenient paths for distribution in accordance with the demands of each local joint mechanism for prevention and control, and establish effective conntections with medical establishments and other recipient units in key areas for epidemic prevention and control, so that 'materials are quickly received and quickly sent on, fully distributed with records kept', with donated funds and materials sent to the frontlines of epidemic prevention of control as soon as possible, to prevent backlog of donations.

VII. Charitable organizations' and the Red Cross Association's acceptance of designated donations of materials are to be delivered in accordance with the donors' wishes or the donor is to directly deliver them to the unit that will ultimately use them. For materials that are donated without specific designation that can be directly delivered to the units ultimately using them, the charitable organizations and Red Cross Association are to coordinate the donor's delivery to the unit or designated location.

VII. Charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association should do a good job of efforts on data reporting and information disclosure on received donations, promptly disclosing the acceptance and allocation of received donations to the public, especially details on the receipt and allocation of key epidemic prevention and control materials, and should actively accept societal oversight.

IX. Charitable organizations and the Red Cross Association should employ methods such as reviewing donation agreements and inspecting relevant supporting documents to have a firm grasp on donated materials such as medicines and medical instruments, ensuring that they are from legal sources, comply with standards, are safe and effective, and are being precisely issued. It is not permitted for donors to make designated donations where persons they have a relationship with are the beneficiaries.

The public may learn about public fundraising credentials of fundraising entities and filed public fundraising activities through the national charitable information disclosure platform (Chinese domain name: "慈善中国" Web address: cishan.chinanpo.gov.cn) or related official websites of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, to rationally select charitable programs to participate in. If situations of charitable organizations or the Red Cross Association violating laws or rules are discovered, a complaint or report may be made to the local civil affairs departments. The Ministry of Civil Affairs is to increase oversight and guidance and sternly address violations of laws and rules.

Ministry of Civil Affairs, Social Organization Management Bureau

Ministry of Civil Affairs; Division for the Promotion of Philanthropy and Social Work

February 14, 2020