面对挑战 参与竞争

面对挑战 参与竞争

Meeting the challenge to compete

Insufficient funding, a lack of trained researchers and inadequate IPR protection are hindering domestic technological innovation

The 12th Five-Year Plan Period (2011-15) is of key importance to China's overall plan for technological innovation and industrial upgrading. An innovation-driven strategy is essential for determining whether China can finish the planned task of industrial adjustment and reform.

But it is clear that the majority of provinces and regions still rely on investment and low labor costs to boost economic development, only certain eastern provinces have realized the importance of an innovation-driven strategy and started shifting to the new mode. However, they face some common problems.

Compared with developed countries, China's technological resources are more dispersed, which has hindered them from playing an effective role in leading economic growth. Manufacturing industries are still at the low end of the international industrial chain, while only a very small percentage of enterprises own independent intellectual property rights to their products.

The problem is made worse by the widening gap between the eastern and western provinces and the lack of technological cooperation.

The lack of coordinated, more balanced development is still a bottleneck for China on its development path.

R&D spending generally accounts for more than 2 percent of the GDP for most innovation-oriented countries. The R&D investment of developed countries such as the United States, Japan and those in the European Union account for 86 percent of the world's total. China lags quite far behind - its investment in R&D, although it grew by 28.88 percent in 2011, was only 1.84 percent of its GDP, much lower than the 4.38 percent of Israel and the 3.09 percent of the US. Besides, while developed countries cover their R&D costs mainly through private financing, China follows the government-oriented model.

Insufficient funding also results in a lack of technological human resources. In 2011, there were only 16 researchers for every 10,000 laborers in China; the percentage was only 17.58 percent of that in the US in 2007 and 10.81 percent for Finland in 2011. The shortage of qualified workers is an increasingly common headache for enterprises, while leading experts are rare in China's research institutions.

China is famous for producing large quantities of technological essays every year, but these essays are hardly of any use. Being run like government agencies, China's universities and research institutions judge researchers' performance by the quantity of essays they publish, compelling them to produce essays as if on a production line. It is hard to imagine such academic rubbish will lead to technological innovations - surveys show that the contribution of technological advance to China's economic growth is 29 percent, while it is around 60 to 80 percent in developed countries.

No doubt China cannot challenge developed countries' monopoly on core technologies; data show that the US, the EU and Japan own 95 percent of all patents in biological engineering and medicine, while high-income countries get 98 percent of all the income from global technology transfer. China's degree of technological dependence is 50 percent while for the US and Japan is 2 to 5 percent. China even has to import core parts for producing a cellphone or a TV set.

The value of China's high-tech industry reached $1,368.6 billion in 2011, ranking first globally; but it had only 891 patents that year, or 1.36 percent of the world's total. That sums up China's position in technological innovation.

What are the root causes for this? There are several besides the above-mentioned insufficient funding and imbalances between eastern and western provinces. For example, China is restricted by its technology management system, which follows an outdated model that does not encourage its researchers to fulfill their potential.

Lack of IPR protection is another factor that curbs China's innovation efforts. In 2012, only 2,000 Chinese enterprises, or 0.03 percent of the total, owned independent intellectual property rights, while 99 percent of all enterprises have never successfully applied for a patent.

At the same time, China lags far behind in legislating for innovations; its current Scientific and Technological Progress Law, adopted in 1993, is inadequate, and its financing sector lacks coordination with innovation too.

It is all these factors together that restrict China's technological innovation. If China hopes to realize the goal of an innovation-driven strategy it must address these issues hindering its technological progress and introduce new mechanisms to better serve this end.

The author is a professor of economics from Fujian Normal University. The Chinese text of this piece appeared in Study Times.

导读：如果中国希望实现创新型战略目标，就必须解决影响其科技发展的障碍，同时引进新的机制来更好的实现这样的目标。

国内技术创新的步伐常被三大不足所阻碍：资金不足、受过专业培训的研究者不足和知识产权保护不足。
“十二五”时期（2011-2015）对于中国技术创新和产业升级的总体规划至关重要。创新性战略对于中国是否可以成功完成产业调整和改革的计划任务也十分关键。
但是，现在明显的问题是，大部分的省、地区仍旧依赖于投资和廉价劳动来促进经济增长，仅有部分东部省份意识到创新性战略的重要性，开始向新模式转型。可是它们都还面临一些同样的问题。
与发达国家相比，中国的技术资源更为分散，这就使资源在促进经济发展的有效性上大打折扣。制造工业更处于国际工业链的底层，而且只有很少的企业对生产的产品拥有独立知识产权。
东、西部省份不断拉大的差距以及技术合作的缺乏使得问题更为严重。
缺失协调平衡的发展仍旧是中国发展的瓶颈。
对于大多数创新型国家来说，研发花费一般会占到国民生产总值的2%。像美国、日本还有欧盟一些国家这样的发达国家，研发投资总数占到全球研发投资数的86%。中国还远远落在后面——尽管在2011年研发投资数增长了28.88%，但还仅占国民生产总值的1.84%。这个数字远远低于以色列4.38%和美国3.09%的水平。另外，当发达国家多靠私人借贷解决研发费用，中国仍旧采用政府主导的模式。
资金不足还导致技术人力资源匮乏。在2011年，中国一万名劳动者中仅有16名研究者。这个比例仅占美国在2007年研究者数量的17.58%、芬兰2011年研究者数量的10.81%。技术工人不足是让企业越来越头疼的问题，同时中国研究机构的知名专家也寥寥无几。
中国以每年发表大量科技论文著称，但是这也论文几乎没有作用。中国的大学和研究机构的运作方式像是政府机构。它们以论文发表数来评价研究者的学术表现。这就迫使研究者像是在一个流水线上，不断发表论文。很难想象这些学术垃圾可以带来技术创新——研究表明，科技进步对于中国经济发展的贡献为29%，但在发达国家这个数字是60%到80%左右。
毫无疑问，中国不能挑战发达国家在核心技术上的垄断。数据显示，美国、欧盟和日本在生物工程和制药学科拥有的专利占其全部专利的95%。高收入国家在全球技术转让过程中能获得总收入的98%。中国的科技依赖程度为50%，但是对于美国和日本，依赖程度仅为2%到5%。为了生产一部手机或是一台电视机，中国甚至还要进口核心零件。
在2011年，中国高科技工业价值达到13686亿元，位列全球第一。但是，在这一年中国仅有891专利，仅占全世界专利总量的1.36%。这很好地表现了中国在科技创新的世界地位。
这一切的根本原因是什么呢？除了上文提到的资金不足和东、西部省份不平衡，还有很多原因。比如说，中国的科技创新还被它的科技管理系统限制，这样的管理系统已经过时，它不能鼓励研究者发挥全部潜能。
知识产权保护不足是另一个阻碍中国创新的因素。在2012年，仅有2000家中国企业，或者说全国0.03%的企业拥有独立知识产权。99%的企业从来没有申请过专利。
与此同时，中国在创新立法上面也远远落后。从1993年开始实施的科技进步法，并不全面，它的融资方面也缺乏不够创新。
正是这所有的因素一起阻碍了中国的科技创新。如果中国希望实现创新型战略目标，就必须解决影响其科技发展的障碍，同时引进新的机制来更好的实现这样的目标。

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