As a China-based pilot I can say with almost certainty that these regulations will have little effect on the situation here.
The real danger lies not in annual limits, but rather in daily ones. There is a flat limit of 16 hours flying per day for 2 pilots, and 18 hours for 3 pilots.
Minimum rest stays at 10 hours regardless of the preceeding duty time.
These limits do not change for 4 sectors, early starts, late finishes, WOCL, Night/day flying or any other factors.
If a place of rest is given whilst on duty, the clock stops. You are at work, but not accruing duty time!
Considering delays of 5 hours after doors closed are regular here and the experience levels in the cockpit this is the real danger.
The following is an actual duty that my company rosters daily (amongst other similar ones):
Report 05:15 in the morning. Fly 2 sectors and land around 1pm. Go to a unbelievably sub-standard (no star) hotel for the afternoon and report for flight preparation again for duty around 8/9pm. Land at destination around 1am, arriving in yet another sub-par hotel around 1.30am.
Recap: start at 05:15, land 1pm. Clock stops. Flight Prep@8/9pm Fly at 10pm until 1am. Total time at work around 19/20 hours in a single day. Time spent in the hotel counts for nil somehow. Perfectly legal.
Have an altitude bust? Get personally fined 12k USD.
http://www.pprune.org/south-asia-far...-airlines.html
The consequences of any incidents regardless of cause have been squarely placed on the individual pilot. This rule does affect that.
So I say this 850 hour limit is a smokescreen for the real issues. If a flight crashes this rule just serves the communist CAAC leaders in that they can pretend they did something. They can claim lower annual hour limits than europe/US.