China’s Signature Move for the Reform of Scientific Research Funding Management: Strengthening the Responsibility for Expenditure, Boosting Staff Motivation and Appointing a Finance Assistant

The central government keeps deepening the reform of scientific research funding management. The State Council held an executive meeting on July 28th and proposed measures for further reforming the management of scientific research funds from the central government. A consensus was reached that the scientific researchers would be motivated to concentrate on scientific research as long as they were given more power to manage the funds on their own.

Picture Source: CFP.CN

The measures proposed at the meeting are as follows: Reducing the number of fund accounts from 9 or more to 3, entitling the project undertaker to adjust the budget for all expenditures including the facility costs at discretion, implementing an expenditure responsibility system for basic research and talent projects, etc. These measures will help to further simplify budgeting and raise the efficiency of grant application.

Also, according to the meeting minutes, the expenses for “human resources” can account for more than 50% of the scientific research funds; for pure theoretical basic research projects such as mathematics, the proportion of indirect expenses can be increased to 60%; R&D institutions can use all the indirect expenses for performance expenditures…This policy “mix” has further motivated the scientific research personnel positively and highlighted the role of “people” so that those who have made achievements have a stronger sense of gain.

It was also clearly pointed out at the meeting, “It’s necessary to accelerate the progress of fund appropriation, i.e., the funds must be transferred to the undertaker within 30 days after the signing of the project assignment paper. After the project is completed, the surplus funds will be retained by the undertaker as direct scientific research expenditures.”

In addition, the attendees proposed to innovate the mode of scientific research funding, request the relevant party to appoint a finance assistant for the scientific research project, and render specialized services such as budgeting, reimbursement, etc. for the purpose of practically easing the burden on scientific research personnel.

The 2020 China International Fair for Trade in Services (referred to as the “Fair”) was held in Beijing from September 4th to 9th, themed “Global Service, Mutual Benefits and Sharing”. At the “Summit on the New Trend of Open Development of Trade in Services” held during the Fair, Chen Jining, Deputy Secretary of the Beijing Municipal Party Committee Major of Beijing City, pointed out, “In terms of innovation, Beijing is committed to building a pilot free trade zone featuring technological innovation, open development of service industry and digital economy. With focus on the leading edge of development, we take digital trade and technological innovation as the main directions to expedite the transformation and upgrading of trade in services, and promote the construction of a pilot free digital trade zone, a big data exchange and a ‘regulatory sandbox’ for cross-border data flow to ensure the orderly flow of data elements.”

Picture Source: Development Research Center of the State Council

According to Chen Jining, Beijing will introduce a package of policies on technological innovation to comprehensively enhance its attractiveness to domestic and foreign innovation resources. Vigorous support will be offered to small and medium-sized enterprises in digitizing themselves, and more “high-level” application scenarios will be provided for technological innovation in firms. Beijing will also formulate and implement municipal regulations on intellectual property right protection and promotion to start pilot work on international intellectual property exchange, intellectual property securitization, etc. to strengthen the protection and utilization of intellectual property rights.

Hou Junshu, Deputy Director of the Standing Committee of Beijing Municipal People’s Congress, said at the “2020 Forum on the Development of Intelligent Technology and Industry” held during the Fair, “In recent years, Beijing has been taking technological innovation as a driving force to continuously promote economic and social development, gradually ushering in a stage of innovation-driven high-quality development.”

In addition to offering vigorous support to basic and cutting-edge research, Beijing makes advance arrangements and colossal investment in quantum computing, brain science and brain-inspired intelligence research in a bid to achieve  breakthroughs in key technologies. By strengthening the top-level design, organization and implementation of city-wide sophisticated industries, the city is offering guidance and support to the commercial application of 5G, cloud computing and blockchain.

Picture Source: China Science Daily

Beijing is also progressive in optimizing the innovation ecosystem. It has promulgated the Regulations on Promoting the Commercialization of Scientific and Technological Achievements, and Several Policy Measures for deepening the Reform of Scientific and Technological System in the New Era to Accelerate the Construction of a National Technological Innovation Center in an effort to positively advance the cooperation between the local innovation subjects and international high-tech resources so that Beijing will further integrate itself into the global innovation network.

The “Forum on Technological Exchanges of Five Major Cutting-Edge Industries in Zhongguancun” was held during the 2020 Fair. With five key fields, including 5G and integrated circuit (IC), AI and intelligent hardware, biomedicine and high-end medical equipment, industrial Internet and intelligent manufacturing, new energy and new materials, at the core, five sub-forums were held in the form of keynote report, project promotion, technical discussion, etc. Business experts and scholars form different fields were invited to exchange ideas on the dynamic development trend of related industries to strengthen the ties and cooperation between innovative subjects in a bid to further build an industrial innovation ecosystem.