More cooperation between scientists has been called for in the drive to make China an innovative nation.

"With the National Middle and Long-term Scientific and Technological Development Plan coming into force, the question now facing us is how to implement its goals," said Chen Zhili, the State Councilor in charge of science and education.

Speaking at the biannual plenary conference of the academicians of the Chinese academies of sciences and of engineering, which ends tomorrow, Chen said increased funding alone would not be enough to build an innovation-led society.

The long-term plan, issued by the State Council in early February, increases annual investment in research and development to 900 billion yuan (US$112 billion) by 2020.

It will boost the proportion of China's gross domestic product spent on research from today's 1.3 percent to 2.5 percent.

"But the increased money alone is not enough," said Chen.

"China's research resources are relatively few compared with advanced countries, and more efficient use of our limited resources remains crucial," she told academicians.

She said there was an urgent need to increase cooperation between research institutes.

"As a whole we have too many small scale research institutes, with poor scope," said Chen.

"The large number of institutes also leads to repeated research, wasting money and talent."

She recommended specialized institutes, such as those under the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), should build closer ties with universities.

In the short term these ties could promote better research and in the long term they could help spread scientific knowledge through society, as graduates move out of universities into the working world.

Chen also called for an increase in cooperation between companies and research institutes, promoting the commercialization of research and improving production techniques.

She added that in order to promote independent innovation, policies are being designed to increase the nation's capacity to absorb and adapt foreign technologies.

She said this would allow China to develop its own, more advanced, technologies, based on imported ones.

However, while praising the massive increase in the State's scientific budget, Liu Gengling, a senior scientist at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, said a great deal of researchers' energies have been spent struggling to qualify for State scientific funding, and as a result research quality might be lowered.

Chen seemed to have noticed his comments and in her two and a half hour speech vowed that funding for regular research will also be increased to meet scientists' basic demands.

The government's science spending will rise by 19.25 per cent to 71.6 billion yuan (US$8.95 billion) this year, the largest increase since reform and opening policies were adopted in late 1970s.

(China Daily June 7, 2006)