Table of Contents
Chapter I — General Provisions
Article 1 — This Law is enacted for the purposes of preventing and reducing the occurrence of emergencies, controlling, mitigating, and eliminating the serious social damage caused by emergencies, regulating the activities responding to emergencies, protecting the safety of people’s lives and property, and safeguarding national security, public security, environmental security, and social order.
Article 2 — This Law shall apply to the prevention of and preparation for emergencies, monitoring and early warning, emergency response and rescue, and post-emergency recovery and reconstruction, and other response activities.
Article 3 — For purposes of this Law, “emergencies” refer to natural disasters, accidental disasters, public health incidents, and social security incidents that occur suddenly and cause or may cause serious social damage and require emergency response measures to be taken. According to the degree of social damage and the scope of impact, natural disasters, accidental disasters, and public health incidents shall be classified into four grades: particularly serious, serious, relatively serious, and general.
Article 4 — The State shall establish an emergency management system featuring unified leadership, comprehensive coordination, classified management, tiered responsibility, and territorial management.
Article 5 — Emergency response work shall adhere to the principle of putting people first and life first. The State shall establish an emergency response mechanism that combines normal and abnormal conditions, integrating peacetime and wartime, with smooth linkage and efficient operation.
Article 6 — The State shall establish an effective social mobilization mechanism, enhance the public safety awareness and self-rescue and mutual rescue capabilities of citizens, and give full play to the role of social forces in emergency response.
Article 7 — The people’s governments at the county level shall be responsible for the emergency response work within their respective administrative regions; where two or more administrative regions are involved, the common people’s government at the next higher level shall be responsible, or the relevant people’s governments at the next higher level shall be jointly responsible.
Chapter II — Prevention and Emergency Preparedness
Article 8 — The State shall establish and improve the emergency response plan system. Emergency plans shall be formulated, revised, and improved based on actual needs and changes in circumstances.
Article 9 — The people’s governments at or above the county level shall establish and improve the management systems for the investigation and registration of hidden dangers and risks, conduct investigations, registration, risk assessments, and regular inspections of the sources of danger and danger areas that are prone to trigger emergencies within their respective administrative areas.
Article 10 — All units shall establish and improve the safety management systems, conduct regular inspections of the implementation of various safety precautions, and promptly eliminate hidden dangers of accidents.
Article 11 — The State shall establish and improve the emergency material reserve and guarantee system, improve the reserve and allocation of important emergency materials, and establish an emergency material procurement and supply system.
Article 12 — The State shall establish an emergency response professional team comprising comprehensive emergency rescue teams, professional emergency rescue teams, and expert teams. People’s governments at or above the county level and their relevant departments may establish adult volunteer emergency rescue teams composed of volunteers.
Article 13 — The State shall establish and improve the emergency communication support system, improve the public communication network, and establish an emergency communication system that combines wired and wireless communications and integrates multiple networks.
Article 14 — The State shall encourage and support research and development of new technologies, equipment, and tools for emergency prevention, monitoring, early warning, emergency response and rescue, and provide strong scientific and technological support for emergency response.
Chapter III — Monitoring and Early Warning
Article 15 — The State Council shall establish a unified national emergency information reporting system. Local people’s governments at or above the county level shall establish or designate a unified emergency information reporting agency.
Article 16 — Local people’s governments at or above the county level shall promptly summarize and analyze the hidden dangers of emergencies and early warning information, and when necessary, organize relevant departments, professional technical personnel, and experts to conduct consultations and assessments.
Article 17 — The State shall establish and improve the emergency early warning system. The early warning levels of natural disasters, accidental disasters, and public health incidents that may occur shall be indicated by red, orange, yellow, and blue in accordance with the emergency situation, development trend, and degree of possible damage, with red being the highest alert level.
Article 18 — Early warning information on emergencies that is about to occur or is likely to occur shall be issued by the local people’s governments at or above the county level in accordance with the relevant laws, administrative regulations, and the limits of authority prescribed by the State Council.
Article 19 — Where an early warning of a red or orange alert has been issued, the people’s government that issued the alert shall take measures such as ordering the emergency rescue teams and personnel to be on standby, mobilizing reserve materials, and ensuring that emergency response facilities and equipment are ready.
Chapter IV — Emergency Response and Rescue
Article 20 — After an emergency occurs, the people’s government performing unified leadership duties or organizing the response to the emergency shall, based on the nature, characteristics, and degree of damage, immediately organize the relevant departments, mobilize the emergency rescue teams and social forces, and take emergency response measures in accordance with the provisions of this Chapter and the provisions of relevant laws and regulations.
Article 21 — The people’s government performing unified leadership duties may, when necessary, request the people’s government at a higher level for support. The people’s government at a higher level shall take measures based on the actual situation to provide support.
Article 22 — After a particularly serious emergency occurs, the State Council shall, in accordance with the provisions of relevant laws and regulations and the relevant emergency plans, organize and coordinate the emergency response work.
Article 23 — After a natural disaster, accidental disaster, or public health incident occurs, the people’s government performing unified leadership duties may take one or more of the following emergency response measures: (1) organizing the rescue and treatment of victims, evacuating, relocating, and properly settling threatened persons, and taking other relief measures; (2) promptly controlling the sources of danger, marking dangerous sites, sealing off dangerous places, delimiting warning zones, and implementing traffic control and other control measures; (3) immediately repairing damaged public facilities such as transportation, communications, water supply, drainage, power supply, gas supply, and heat supply; (4) prohibiting or restricting the use of relevant equipment and facilities, closing or restricting the use of relevant premises, suspending activities with dense crowds, or production and business activities that may expand the damage.
Article 24 — After a social security incident occurs, the people’s government shall promptly control the situation, prevent the situation from expanding, and restore social order as soon as possible.
Chapter V — Post-Emergency Recovery and Reconstruction
Article 25 — After the threat and damage caused by an emergency have been controlled or eliminated, the people’s government performing unified leadership duties shall cease the emergency response measures taken in accordance with the provisions of this Law and simultaneously take or continue to implement necessary measures to prevent the occurrence of secondary or derivative incidents.
Article 26 — After an emergency has occurred, the people’s government shall promptly organize the assessment of the losses caused by the emergency, organize the affected areas to resume production, life, work, and social order as soon as possible, formulate recovery and reconstruction plans, and repair damaged public facilities.
Article 27 — The State shall establish a financial support system for post-emergency recovery and reconstruction. The people’s governments at or above the county level shall provide financial support for the recovery and reconstruction of the affected areas, and may formulate and implement preferential policies such as tax relief and fee reductions.
Chapter VI — Legal Liability
Article 28 — Where a local people’s government or a relevant government department violates the provisions of this Law and fails to perform its statutory duties, the people’s government at a higher level or the relevant department shall order it to make corrections; where the circumstances are serious, the directly responsible person in charge and other directly liable persons shall be given sanctions in accordance with the law.
Article 29 — Where a relevant unit commits any of the following acts, the public security organ shall impose penalties in accordance with the law: (1) failing to take preventive measures as required, causing the occurrence of a serious emergency; (2) failing to promptly eliminate the hidden dangers that may trigger an emergency that have been discovered; (3) failing to carry out emergency response work as required, seriously affecting the emergency response work.
Article 30 — Where anyone fabricates or disseminates false information about the development of an emergency or the emergency response work, the relevant department shall order the person to make corrections and impose a warning; where the act causes serious consequences, the person’s business shall be suspended or the person’s license shall be revoked in accordance with the law.
Chapter VII — Supplementary Provisions
Article 31 — Emergency response to emergencies that occur within the territory of the PRC that cause damage to the property or personal safety of foreign nationals shall be governed by the relevant provisions of laws, administrative regulations, and international treaties.
Article 32 — This Law shall come into effect on November 1, 2007. The revision of this Law shall come into effect on November 1, 2024.
Disclaimer: This translation is provided for informational and reference purposes only. While every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, this is not an official translation and should not be relied upon as legal advice. The official Chinese text of the Emergency Response Law of the People’s Republic of China shall prevail. For matters involving legal rights or obligations, please consult a qualified legal professional familiar with PRC law. Dan Young Business Consultancy makes no representation or warranty, express or implied, as to the accuracy or completeness of this translation and accepts no liability for any loss or damage arising from reliance on it.
