By Zhang Xin, Research Team on “Prospects of China’s Engineering Technology Development by 2040”, Research Department of Innovation Development, DRC

Research Report, No.39, 2018 (Total 5314) 2018-3-2

Abstract: China has constructed a relatively complete “top-down” public sci-tech resource allocation and policy-making mechanism. However, for lack of a bottom-up-based information transmission and feedback mechanism, decisions are not properly made in a sound way and resource allocation efficiency remains to be enhanced. The present public sci-tech resource allocation is mainly based on experts’ assessment and the decisions made by departments in charge, while people from industrial sectors and relevant stakeholders rarely get involved in it. As a result, scientific research outcomes are divorced from industrial demand and the supportive policies are neither in line with resource allocation nor in light of local conditions. Besides, some departments even adopted “one-size-fits-all” and the herd mentality approach toward the above-mentioned issue. The European Union has launched and implemented the Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialization (RIS3) in recent years, aiming at improving the allocation efficiency of public R&D inputs, nurturing regional competitive edges, promoting inter-regional policy synergy and boosting economic structure transformation. This strategy focuses on defining the priority of public R&D inputs and innovation policies according to the local potential competitive edges. On the basis of analyzing the implementation steps and main features of EU’s RIS3, this paper puts forward relevant policy options on further improving decision-making mechanism for public sci-tech resource allocation in China.

Key words: RIS3, smart specialization, public sci-tech resources, a bottom-up-based mechanism