More than 98 percent of Chinese cities have established health inspection agencies, the China Health Inspection Association (CHIA) announced Saturday.

The statement released at the CHIA inaugural annual conference cited a estimate by Ministry of Health that health inspection agencies had been established in 342 of China's 347 city-level regions and 95 percent of the country's counties.

Health inspection agencies are responsible for administrative inspection and licensing of food safety in restaurants, sanitation in public places, cosmetics enterprises and water suppliers, according to a guideline for health inspection agencies published by the Health Ministry.

They are also responsible for assisting epidemic prevention work, occupational disease prevention and closing illegal hospitals.

Health inspection at grassroots level was an important part of building a national health inspection system, said Zhao Tonggang, vice-president of the CHIA.

However, Zhao said, China's health inspection system suffered imbalances among different regions and between urban and rural areas.

A lack of staff and under-developed health infrastructure posed obstacles to the sound development of China's health inspection system, Zhao said.

The CHIA was founded last year and operates under the administration of the Health Ministry.