Xi Jinping urges China to step up efforts to master key technology

The Chinese President told a meeting of a policy implementation body that key areas should be identified based on the country’s strategic needs

The country is locked in intense technological conflict with the US, was banned investment in Chinese firmed linked to the security and defence sectors

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China’s leader said the authorities should identify key areas based on its strategic needs. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 11:00pm, 7 Sep 2022

China must strengthen top-down planning and pool resources nationwide to push for breakthroughs in core technologies, President Xi Jinping has said.

Xi told a meeting of the Central Commission for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms in Beijing that resource allocation should be optimised and key areas identified based on the country’s strategic needs, state news agency Xinhua reported.

Xi’s remarks come amid rising technological competition with the United States and as the current White House expands the previous administration’s bans on investment in Chinese companies linked to its defence and security sectors.

The past two years have seen a number of Chinese technology companies blacklisted by Washington for allegedly supporting the military’s artificial intelligence capabilities and related activities, including the leading AI firm SenseTime, which the US accused of being involved in human rights abuses in Xinjiang.

Xi has repeatedly called for a strong focus on core sectors, which include computer processors, communications, nuclear power, genetic engineering, precision manufacturing, space technology and the study of infectious diseases.

“Sanctions from the US, including those that have almost crippled Huawei, serve as a wake-up call for the Chinese in that, in this new era of competition among superpowers, however reluctant they may be to compete with Washington, they have to join the game,” said Xu Qinduo, a political analyst with the Chinese public policy think tank Pangoal Institution.

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