Liu Yandong showed support for Beijing’s bid for the 2022 Winter Olympics. (Photo : www.telegraph.co.uk)
Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong, during her speech at a recent inspection tour in south China's Guangdong Province, issued a call for more innovation and continued upgrading of the country's traditional industries, the Global Times reported.
Liu asked for more efforts to be made in unleashing innovation in Chinese society as well as in promoting the upgrade of the country's traditional industries to create new growth engines and give "momentum for better-quality economic growth."
The 69-year-old Liu said that priority should be given to "innovation-driven development strategies" and in deepening reforms in science and technology. China, she maintained, should keep in line with the trends in frontier science and technology and industrial breakthroughs and tackle key problems to "create original innovation fruits."
To be able to stand on "the commanding heights of global competition," the Chinese people, she advised, should aim at building up a "Created-in-China" Web-economy.
The vice premier also urged for a continuing drive for upgrading the country's more traditional industries. This, she believed, can be done through better and more focused coordination of innovative science, technology, fiscal, financial and even personnel policies.
Liu said that improving financing services for businesses in particular, especially in providing better access to sufficient capital for startups to takeoff, will help the nation in building "first-class science and technology innovation centers with global influence."
The Chinese leadership has long been aiming at encouraging innovation. In fact, it has set clear objectives to promote indigenous innovations under the approved 12th Five Year Plan (2011-2015). Under the Plan, the state has set the following goals: expenditure on research and development to account for 2.2 percent GDP; and every 10,000 people to have 3.3 patents.
China has been investing heavily in science and technology, and the efforts are paying off.
David Wertime at the global magazine Foreign Policy wrote: "It's official: China is becoming a new innovation powerhouse. The world's factory is turning into an R&D machine--and fast catching up with America."
