Report on the Work of the Government

5. Thoroughly implementing the strategies of developing China through science and education and strengthening the country through human resource development

To make China prosperous and strong and achieve the revival of the Chinese nation, we need to vigorously develop science, technology, and education and create a high-quality talent pool.

We will continue to give high priority to developing education. The central government has already prepared its budget to meet the requirement that government spending on education accounts for 4% of China's GDP, and local governments should act accordingly to ensure that this target is reached. Funds for education must be used to meet the funding requirements in key areas and strengthen weak links so that they yield better results. We will deepen reform of the educational system, strengthen the corps of teachers, energetically implement well-rounded education, and gradually resolve major problems in examination and enrollment, and in education and teaching. We will carry forward and gradually institutionalize democratic school management. We will promote the balanced development of compulsory education and give preference to schools in the central and western regions, rural areas, remote areas, and ethnic minority areas, and to weak urban schools when allocating resources. We will continue to make great efforts to ease contentious issues of great concern to the people, including paying to enroll one's children in better schools and the shortage of preschools. We will arrange the location of rural primary and secondary schools in light of local conditions, and ensure there is a proper balance between improving the quality of education and placing schools closer to children. We will run rural boarding schools well, and implement the plan for improving nutrition for rural students receiving compulsory education. We will enhance school bus and campus safety to ensure children's safety. We will strengthen preschool, continuing and special education, develop a modern vocational education system, and do a good job educating ethnic minority students. Higher education should better meet the needs of economic and social development and China's strategic requirements, and improve its quality and capacity for making innovations. We will improve the state financial aid system for students by gradually making all rural students exempt from paying tuition for secondary vocational education, and by granting financial aid to more students from poor families who attend regular senior secondary schools. We will vigorously develop privately run schools and encourage and guide nongovernmental investment in all types of schools at all levels. The people place their hopes on education, and education is crucial for China's future, so we must achieve even better results in this work.

We will vigorously boost innovation in science and technology. We will strengthen the national innovation system. We will deepen reform of the management system for science and technology, spur enterprises to become the main source of technological innovation, and more closely integrate science and technology with the economy. We will support enterprises in developing R&D centers and undertaking major national and regional science and technology projects. We will guide research institutes and researchers in universities in providing services to enterprises' technological innovation centers so that enterprises, universities, and research institutes can work more closely together to increase the industrial application of scientific and technological advances. We will boost basic research and research in cutting-edge technologies, and improve our capacity to make original innovations. We will improve the evaluation and incentive system for scientific and technological advances. We will advocate academic integrity, encourage independent thinking, ensure academic freedom, and foster a scientific spirit. We will unwaveringly implement the national strategy on intellectual property rights.

We will comprehensively strengthen human resource work. We will deepen reform of the personnel management system; energetically train high-level innovative and entrepreneurial personnel, talented young people, and personnel who are urgently needed and in short supply; and attract talented personnel from overseas. We will improve the mechanism for training, employing, evaluating, and giving incentives to talented personnel, and create a favorable social environment for them to come to the fore in large numbers and tap their full potential.