A Juneyao Airlines flight from Beijing to Shanghai was delayed five hours after a child was found in the aircraft without a ticket, the airline said yesterday.

Crew on Flight HO1252, which was scheduled to take off at 6:55 a.m. on Sunday, found the child on board without a ticket.

The child passed the security check, the boarding gate and a final check before boarding the plane with the help of his family. He was accompanied by two adults and another two children, according to the Beijing Capital International Airport.

The five were asked to get off the aircraft, while all other passengers on the flight were asked to go through the security check again.

The flight eventually took off around noon after being delayed for nearly five hours. The child’s age and gender were not given.

According to civil aviation regulations, the security check authority should inspect the certificates of passengers along with other safety checks. If the authority failed to perform the duty, the civil aviation authority can face fines up to 30,000 yuan (US$4,433).

The airline has reported the incident to the Civil Aviation Administration of China, which has launched an investigation and will publicize the outcome, the airline told Shanghai Daily.

The Shanghai-based airline issued a statement yesterday to remind passengers that children aged 2 and over need a ticket and must be accompanied by an adult. Even an infant who does not occupy a seat needs an infant ticket.

The airline said it was also investigating the incident with the Beijing airport authority and the agent company which manages passengers.

The parents of the child should take the main responsibility, while the ground service company and airport authority should take minor responsibility, said Li Xiaojin, a civil aviation expert with the Civil Aviation University of China.

“Other passengers on the flight can sue them and ask for compensation for the five-hour delay,” Li said.

China should improve its investment and market environment, accelerate opening up to the outside world and lower operating costs, Chinese President Xi Jinping said Monday.

The country should “create a stable, fair, transparent and predictable business environment, and speed up efforts to build an open economy in a bid to promote the sustainable and healthy development of the Chinese economy,” Xi said at a meeting of the Central Leading Group on Finance and Economic Affairs.

An important goal of building an open economy is to stimulate improvement of domestic institutions and laws for higher efficiency and greater competitive strength in the global market, said the president.

Foreign investment has played a significant role in China’s economic development, promoting reasonable allocation of resources and driving market-oriented reforms, he told the meeting.

China should continue to make good use of foreign investment to advance supply-side structural reforms, upgrade the economy, and catch up with global technology development, Xi said.

He urged faster efforts to lift restrictions on foreign access to and ownership in sectors such as child care, elderly care, architectural design, accounting, auditing, commerce, logistics, e-commerce, general manufacturing and services.

The “negative list” approach on foreign investment management, which has been adopted in the country’s pilot free trade zones, should be expanded to the whole nation as soon as possible, he said.

A negative list approach identifies sectors and businesses that are off-limits or restricted for investment.

Xi also called for faster work to unify laws and regulations on domestic and foreign businesses and make new fundamental laws on foreign investment.

Laws, rules, and policies out of tune with the overall direction and principle of opening up should be abolished or revised within a time limit, and national treatment in laws and policies should be granted to foreign-funded companies after they enter the market, the president said.

Xi urged megacities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen to take the lead in improving business environment, demanding moves to reduce inspections and fines on companies and ban illegal fee charging.

He stressed the importance of protecting intellectual property rights (IPR), calling on authorities to better laws and regulations, improve the quality and efficiency of intellectual property examinations, and speed up institutional improvement for IPR protection related to emerging sectors and new business types.

Wrongdoing should be punished more severely so that IPR infringers will pay heavy prices, said the president.

Speaking of the financial sector, Xi said those areas that help protect consumers’ rights and interests, promote orderly competition, and prevent financial risks should be opened up faster.

He demanded efforts to advance opening-up of the capital account in an orderly manner, and steadily push the yuan to become an international currency.

The yuan’s exchange rate formation mechanism should be improved, and the currency’s value should be kept basically stable at a reasonable and balanced level, Xi said.

To keep up with the pace of financial opening up, China must have a strong regulatory capability, the president noted.

He urged financial regulators to learn from international experience, address weak links and improve the way of regulation.

On foreign trade, Xi stressed expanding imports while stabilizing exports to promote balance of payment under the current account.

He demanded measures to make foreign trade more liberalized and convenient, saying institutional costs of import should be lowered, quarantine and custom clearance be streamlined, and that companies’ complaints be better addressed.

Authorities must study reducing tariffs on certain consumer goods and encourage the import of specialty products, Xi said.

A market environment featuring fair play should be created in the country, giving businesses equal treatment in tariff collection, import quarantine and marketing to let consumers and the market have the say, according to the president, who is also head of the leading group.

The meeting was also attended by Premier Li Keqiang, who is deputy head of the group, and Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli, a member of the group.

A political documentary on China’s ongoing reform will be aired starting Monday on China Central Television, the state broadcaster.

The ten-episode documentary, “Jiang Gaige Jinxing Daodi,” or carrying the reform through to the end, summarizes the progress and achievements of the overall reform initiated after the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 2012.

It features authoritative theoretical discussions on the reform, as well as reform examples from the grassroots.

Topics of the episodes include economy, politics, social management, Chinese culture, environment, the armed forces and the Party’s self-governance.

With the 19th CPC National Congress scheduled for the second half of 2017, the documentary is expected to inspire CPC members and the Chinese people.

It will also be available on the state broadcaster’s new media platform.