China wants to be a global talent hub, but what if they don’t want to come?

Attracting top-tier professionals is critical to China’s economic competitiveness, and a broadening tech war with the US makes Beijing’s mission all the more urgent

Despite progress, factors such as lacklustre pay, a utilitarian research environment, and political concerns are impeding China’s ability to attract and retain top-level talent

6-MIN READ6-MIN

China is trying to roll out the red carpet to lure top-tier talent, but factors such as a devalued yuan and high housing prices are keeping some away. Illustration: Henry Wong

Published: 7:00am, 8 Nov 2022

At China’s recently concluded party congress, President Xi Jinping outlined ambitions to build the nation into a hub of global talent. But the road to reaching that goal promises to be a bumpy one.

Li Rongzhong decided to return to China in 2019 after teaching at Wake Forest University in the United States, where he earned postgraduate degrees in physics and computer science. He returned to expand his company, Petoi, which makes robotic cats and dogs, and he set his sights on Shenzhen as a production base because of its comprehensive supply chain and relatively low operational costs.

However, nearly all of the Chinese scientists and researchers that he knew in the US chose to stay there after landing cushy jobs at universities.

“The interpersonal relationships are much simpler [in the US],” he said. “I have an old schoolmate who came back to China to work in a university but couldn’t fit in and always felt bullied.”

Talent has always been deemed critical to China’s economic competitiveness, and that need has only become more pressing as the country emphasises self-sufficiency amid curbs on technology imports from the US.

Despite some progress, factors such as lacklustre pay, a utilitarian research environment, and political concerns have been cited as constraints on China’s ability to attract and retain top-level talent.

The progress can be seen in research and development investment, which rose 14.2 per cent to 2.78 trillion yuan (US$381.7 billion) last year, and the report delivered by Xi said the country has the largest number of R&D workers in the world.