Zhang Zhihao
NBS. However, with a population of more than 1.3 billion, the country trails other major nations in terms of the density of its scientific workforce.
From 2008 to October, Chinese scientists published more than 2.27 million international papers, second only to the 3.9 million published by US scientists during the same period, according to the 2018 edition of Statistical Data of Chinese Science and Technology Papers.
Last year, the country’s scientists moved into second place, behind the US, in two fields new to them — Earth science and plant and animal science. In all, China ranks second globally in 10 fields, with the others being: agricultural science; chemistry; computer science; engineering; environmental science; mathematics; physics; and pharmaceuticals.
In addition to factors such as budget, workforce and scientific output, China also began reforming its scientific institutions last year to reduce red tape. The Ministry of Science and Technology and the Chinese Academy of Sciences have been testing new rules to streamline administration, grant more autonomy to researchers and create more efficient systems for managing funding and expenses.
“The goal of the reforms is to reduce the time and energy that scientific workers need to spend on paperwork, and provide more effective management and services for them to innovate,” said Xie Pengyun, director of development planning at CAS.
In April, ZTE Corp, China’s second-biggest telecommunications equipment maker, was forced to suspend operations because inventories were almost exhausted. The situation arose after the US imposed a seven-year ban on the company purchasing crucial components, including computer chips, after allegations it had breached sanctions on the export of goods to Iran.
Although the ban was lifted three months later, the incident was a wake-up call because it illustrated how dependent and vulnerable the nation’s industries are to disruptions to supplies of imported equipment, especially mid- to high-end apparatus and products.
At the same time, there is still room for improvement in China’s scientific drive. The amount of R&D funding allocated for basic research still lags developed countries. In addition, the number of international collaborations and foreign talent in China, both in research and the high-tech industries, are noticeably lower than in other technological powerhouses, such as the US.
The impact and quality of China’s scientific papers also left much to be desired. The 2-million-plus papers published by Chinese scientists in the past decade received an average of 10 citations each, ranking China 16th out of the 22 nations that had published more than 200,000 papers during the same period, according to the data for 2018.
To tackle these issues, Bai, from CAS, said in December that China’s scientists will need to focus on solving key technical issues that are hampering the nation’s socioeconomic development.
“We need to enhance basic and frontier scientific research, thus overcoming our lack of original groundbreaking research and innovation,” he said.
China will also raise the number of international exchanges and deepen cooperation in science, and make new contributions to tackling common challenges and facilitating progress worldwide, he said.
The country will also undertake a range of reforms to nurture and unleash the full potential of homegrown talent, attract high-quality foreign experts and improve research ethics and academic honesty, he added.
“We need greater courage, resolve and tenacity to overcome bottlenecks in science and development,” Bai said.
“This will enable deeper integration between science and the economy, thus opening the path for China to transition into a stronger nation.”