China will launch a nationwide inspection of businesses engaged in dangerous chemicals and explosives after the explosions in Tianjin, the State Council said on Friday. [Special coverage]
In an emergency notice, the State Council Work Safety Commission said the deadly blasts at the warehouse storing dangerous chemicals revealed a lack of safety awareness among businesses and lax implementation of safety regulations.
Other problems exposed by the blasts include inadequate safety management of dangerous materials at ports, irregular practices among workers, weak emergency responses to incidents and lax supervision by authorities, said the notice.
The commission said lessons learned from the blasts are "extremely profound."
It demanded governments at all levels strictly control the access threshold for industrial projects dealing with these materials, and firmly implement regulatory measures for highly toxic chemicals such as cyanide, as well as inflammable and explosive materials.
The warehouse blasts, which occurred late Wednesday night, killed at least 56 people, including 21 firefighters. A total of 721 were injured, with 25 of them still in critical condition. The cause is being investigated.
The warehouse was owned by Tianjin Dongjiang Port Rui Hai International Logistics Co. Ltd., which was founded in 2011. It is a storage and distribution center for containers of dangerous goods.
