FOI Annual Report in Shanghai (2008)

Shanghai government agencies received 9388 requests in 2008. 9027 requests were determined in this year, of which, 5320 (58.9%) were granted in full, 287 in part (3.2%) and 2918 (37.9%) wholly refused. Of these refusals, 972 were refused on the basis of wrong agencies approached, 1028 were refused due to the non-existence of information, and 465 were rejected because of unclear requests. The information requested by 343 applicants did not fall into the definition of information under the Shanghai FOI Rules. Only 502 requests fell into six legitimate FOI exemptions. The exemption of state secrets, amounting to 304, has been frequently claimed by government agencies during this year.
The rest were refused because of commercial secrets (32), personal privacy (8), deliberations (61), social stability (14) and other reasons (83).