Researchers conduct an experiment when China’s Mozi, the world’s first quantum science satellite, passes by the sky over the test station in Ali, Tibet Autonomous Region. (XINHUA)

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Currently, innovation in science and technology is a crucial aspect of adjusting the economic structure and developing new engines of growth. Global R&D expenditure and contribution rate are maintaining stable growth against the backdrop of a weak world economy while China and other emerging economies are rapidly catching up. In this context, the trend of innovation is spreading to the entire world.

China released its 15-year plan for science and technology in 2006 to improve national scientific innovation and solve political and economic problems, such as finding the proper balance between domestic efforts and engagement with the global community. China has achieved a capacity to innovate beyond its economic development stage through hard work in the past few years, which can be seen in the increasing R&D strength of companies and the huge progress it has made in terms of the efficiency and quality of its knowledge output.

The country has reached 17th on world’s innovation index ranking while the gap is narrowing between it and the leading innovators. China’s R&D expenditure ranks second only to that of the United States with nearly 4 million people involved in the academic circle, the largest number in the world. Also, the creativity ability is improving. The number of Chinese Science Citation Index papers places second. China, Japan, the United States and South Korea account for 90 percent of the world’s total domestic application and authorization of invention patents. About 968,000 applications for invention patents have been filed in China and 263,000 invention patents have been issued, both taking the lead in the world, according to the report.

Technology is making increasing contributions to economic development. Prospects are promising for knowledge-intensive sectors, and their structures are undergoing constant optimization. The Chinese economy has achieved huge progress since the introduction of reform and opening-up policies, and its sustainable growth ensures continued investment in R&D resources. At present, innovation of science and technology continues to fuel economic development.

The contribution of science and technology to the economy is growing steadily while innovation has become the leading driving factor of development. Of the five development concepts, China prioritized innovation at the fifth plenum of 18th CPC Central Committee, stressing that the innovation of science and technology can bring new ideas to an extensive array of domains. The contribution rate indicates the scale of economic growth brought by progress in science and technology, and it is used in economics to evaluate changes in a country’s growth pattern and development quality. 

R&D intensity—R&D spending as a percentage of GDP—reflects the level of investment in innovation. It is the result of structural adjustment in the economy as well as the coordination between economy and science. China’s investment structure is going through profound changes due to its enormous and rapid increase in R&D intensity. Thus, innovation of science and technology has started to promote its economic development.

Meanwhile, sector structure is constantly improving. The arrival of a knowledge economy has made various elements increasingly important, such as talent, knowledge, science and technology as well as education. Knowledge-intensive sectors, characterized by high-technology equipment and high-profile talent, are a testament to the transformation and upgrade of sector structure.

Generally, there is large room for China to develop its ability to innovate.

First, the country’s innovation efficiency is increasing. Currently, its advantages lie in the enormous scale of innovation so that the future efforts will mainly focus on the aspects of efficiency and quality. Also, the focus of attention, with the advance of education and digitization, will shift to reinvent China with a support of a science and technology workforce even though labor-intensive sectors helped China to develop at a miraculous speed in the past several decades. The dividends brought by digitization and talent pool of science and technology will make China a more competitive innovator.

The future improvement of innovation also comes from the huge economic scale. China’s GDP surpassed Japan to become the second-largest economy in 2010 and China’s economic output accounted for 15.5 percent of the world’s total in 2015. The economic aggregate creates substantial demand for innovation as well as an enormous commercial marketplace for innovative products. Also, it provides continued financial support to innovation.

In addition, the deepening of reform has released a massive amount of innovation vitality. For example, the central government has endeavored to streamline administration and delegate power to the lower administrative levels. It also advocates an incentive salary mechanism and encourages the R&D workforce to apply innovation achievements by setting up various rewards.
The cause of domestic innovation is rapidly developing. In the future, China should continue to increase spending on R&D and make full use of the huge market while paying greater attention to the reform of science and technology mechanisms. Measures also should be taken to commercialize the achievements and promote the production efficiency of society as a whole, thus successfully building an innovative China.

 

(edited by MA YUHONG)