Local residents wait to pay at the counter in a shop in Seoul, South Korea, Feb. 24, 2020. South Korea confirmed 231 more cases of the COVID-19 on Monday, raising the total number of infections to 833, and the death toll rose to eight. The country raised its four-tier virus alert to the highest "red" level on Sunday as the virus infections soared for the past week. (Xinhua/Wang Jingqiang)

China will classify regions outside Hubei Province and Beijing into low, medium, and high-risk areas based on the extent and severity of the local COVID-19 epidemic situation, The National Development and Reform Commission announced on Tuesday.

County-level administration regions outside Beijing and Hubei Province will be categorized into three classes, namely low, medium, and high-risk regions, Ou Xiaoli, an official with the commission said during a Tuesday press conference.

Regions with a low-risk classification will resume overall normal life production, and lift transport restrictions. Governments of these regions should help companies address challenges and problems including the lack of employment and raw materials, the commission noted.

In low-risk regions, no conditions or excuses such as paperwork review procedures should be set or used to bar companies from resuming production or delay the recovery of these companies' normal operations, it regulated.

Shu Zhaohui, an official with the Ministry and Information Technology also at the press conference, stated currently the rate of work and production resumption for small to medium-sized enterprises across China is only around 30 percent, which is worrisome. And the smaller the company is, the lower their production resumption rates are.