On 19 November 2010, the State Council promulgated the Regulations on the Administration of the Registration of Resident Representative Offices of Foreign Enterprises ("Registration Regulations").  The Registration Regulations will take effect on 11 March 2011 and will simultaneously repeal the almost two-decades old Measures on the Administration of the Registration of Resident Representative Offices of Foreign Enterprises ("1983 Measures").  Another set of existing (and even older) rules, the Tentative Rules on the Administration of Resident Representative Offices of Foreign Enterprises ("1980 Tentative Rules"), are not repealed by the Registration Regulations, but they are now outdated with respect to matters relating to registration of representative offices that fall within the powers of the State Administrative for Industry and Commerce ("SAIC") and its local counterparts ("AIC").  As the Registration Regulations and the 1980 Tentative Rules both were adopted by the State Council, pursuant to China's hierarchy of laws a provision of the Registration Regulations will prevail over a conflicting provision of the 1980 Tentative Rules. 

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