BEIJING -- A senior drug safety supervisor warned that China faces a severe situation of cracking down upon counterfeit medicines.

An increasing number of offences have occurred in the production and distribution of traditional Chinese medicines, said Yin Li, director of the State Food and Drug Administration, in a statement issued on the SFDA official website Friday.

Also, more and more offenders sell counterfeit medicines through Internet, Yin said.

In the latter half of this year, the SFDA will step up joint actions with other law enforcement agencies and government departments to curb counterfeit medicines, he said.

Efforts will be made to improve the coordination among drug safety agencies from different regions as well as cooperation between the government and enterprises, he said.

In addition, the SFDA will start an inspection on the production of medicines listed as the national essential medicines in the next four months.