Scientific, technological modernization emphasized in promoting China's advancement

The Minister of Science and Technology emphasized the crucial role of scientific and technological modernization in advancing China's advancement during the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30) in Beijing on Friday, highlighting the need to raise the innovation capacity to lead the development of new quality productive forces.

"We should promote advances in original innovation and breakthroughs in core technologies in key fields," Yin Hejun told a news conference on the guiding principles from the fourth plenary session of the 20th Communist Party of China Central Committee.

Yin proposed creating a new national system to mobilize resources nationwide, aiming for decisive breakthroughs in core technologies across the entire chain in areas like integrated circuits, industrial machine tools, and high-end instruments.

"We should prioritize national strategic needs by deploying a range of major national scientific and technological tasks," he said.

Additionally, efforts should be made to enhance the strategic, forward-looking, and systematic layout of basic research, with an increase in long-term and stable support. There will also be a strengthened focus on original innovation in scientific research and technological development to generate more landmark original achievements.

Yin also proposed the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation with industrial innovation.

"We should reinforce the dominant role of enterprises in scientific and technological innovation by supporting them in leading the formation of innovation consortia and undertaking more national scientific and technological tasks," Yin said.

He mentioned cultivating and expanding technology-leading enterprises, supporting the development of high-tech enterprises and technology-based small and medium-sized enterprises, and increasing the proportion of tax deductions for enterprise research and development expenses.

Yin proposed the integrated development of education, science and technology, and talent by establishing a coordinated mechanism for integrated advancement. This involves strengthening planning alignment, policy synergy, resource allocation, and evaluation linkage, aiming to work for technological innovation, industrial development, and national strategy.

"We should promote the construction of a Digital China by establishing an open, shared, and secure national integrated data market," Yin said.

He added that this involves facilitating the deep integration of the real economy with the digital economy and accelerating the innovation of digital technologies such as artificial intelligence.

Strengthening the efficient supply of computing power, algorithms, and data is crucial, as is fully implementing the "AI Plus" initiative to comprehensively empower all industries and sectors, he added.