In recent months one job has become a focal point on the agenda of government officials: sorting out the myriad of stamps.

After rounds of deregulation reform, the southern province of Guangdong has trimmed the number of items requiring provincial government approval to 1,089 - down from 1,972 in 1997.

Shenyang, capital of Liaoning Province, has removed hundreds of redundant stamps over the past six months. The municipal government also ordered local bureaux to slash the time of handling applications for approvals.

In Wuhan, capital of Central China's Hubei Province, more than 20 local bureaux, including the police, taxation and commercial administration, opened a "one stop" joint centre last month where businesses and individuals can procure all approvals rather than shuttling between respective offices.

Spurring these changes is the Law on Administrative Licensing that will take effect in July.

The new code, passed by the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress late last year, is expected to bring sweeping changes in the government's performance and boost the country's efforts to build a market economy and check corruption.

According to the law, the kinds of matters that require legal permission cover fields ranging from national and public securities, macro-economic co-ordination, ecological and environmental protection to public health. In particular, only national and provincial legislative bodies and the State Council are authorized to define these matters.

By limiting the sources of licensing power, the law effectively prevents government agencies from randomly levying licensing, a practice which often complicates the process of business and breeds corruption.

Presumably, thousands of ad hoc stamps issued by various government agencies to empower themselves will be annulled once the new law comes into effect. The lengthy and exhausting procedures of procuring hundreds of government permissions for a small business, as many applicants have already experienced, will soon be history.

Besides triggering a quantitative decrease in licensing matters, the new law will redefine the government's role.

According to the law, when application approval involves different offices within an administrative agency, the agency must appoint a single office to deal with the request. It also sets strict time limits for processing applications in order to prevent government offices from passing the buck.

The rules will exempt applicants from the pain of running back and forth between all those offices, which could in some cases lead them nowhere.

The law also requires government agencies to make public all detailed information involved in licensing, including law articles that promulgate the licensing, application materials that should be submitted, and a sample of the application form. It also forbids approval agencies to ask for kickbacks or force applicants to buy designated commodities or items of service.

The licensing code answers the call for a clean and efficient administration commensurate with China's growing market system. It will also help China fulfil its promise to the World Trade Organization on standardizing government service and increasing policy transparency.

The government will no longer have an unlimited role under the tightened rein on licensing, which used to be a hallmark of power. Yet the restrained approach to market affairs, as provided in the licensing code, will help unfetter economic potential and ensure further prosperity.

The deregulation of many previously licensed matters will enable the government to devote more resources to such public services as education, healthcare and welfare to build a harmonious civil infrastructure.

By trimming the work load in approval, the law will facilitate the government's long-standing bid to downsize bloated agencies which have even frustrated substantial wage hikes for civil servants.

The scenario is drawing nearer, as government bodies at different levels are running against time to adapt to the licensing law.

Besides the immediate changes, however, there remains a long-term job to change the administration's old mindset.

A decree on the licensing of drug selling issued by the State Food and Drug Administration last month has ignited controversy. It requires drug retailers to be able to supply drugs "in 24 hours" as a prerequisite to obtaining a licence.

Critics say drug stores' work schedules should be decided by themselves according to market situations, and it is also beyond the drug administration's portfolio to oversee pharmacists and the quality of drugs.

This is only one of a host of examples of how administrations extend their presence - sometimes unconsciously - when exercising power.

Although the market system has taken shape in the country, the decades-long planned economic system has made government agencies accustomed to playing an all-powerful director, not only in licensing affairs but also in their daily administration of economic and social life. It will be a time-consuming process to erase such inertia.

Nevertheless, what offers optimism is that the legislation on licensing, by providing institutionalized restraint on the government's role, will push self-reform of government forward in a gradual but non-stop way.