Summary: The article announces that China's Ecological Environment Code will take effect on August 15, 2026, as the country's second law named a "code," framing it as a major legal achievement implementing Xi Jinping's ecological civilization thought that systematizes natural resource protection systems. The piece outlines priorities for the 15th Five-Year Plan period, including optimizing spatial development patterns, improving resource allocation efficiency, advancing green transformation, and strengthening resource security. Specific implementation areas covered include territorial spatial planning, natural resource asset management, farmland protection, mineral resource development, marine exploitation, and ecological restoration projects. The article emphasizes using the Code to support high-level protection driving high-quality economic development while safeguarding national security in food, energy, and supply chains.
Summary: President Xi Jinping emphasized at the National Science and Technology Award Conference that China must strengthen the integration of scientific innovation supply with industrial demand, accelerate the transformation of technology into productive forces, and deepen the fusion of technological and industrial innovation. The article outlines four key policy priorities: establishing concept verification centers and pilot testing platforms to bridge the gap from lab to mass production; enhancing enterprises' role as innovation leaders through increased R&D investment and foundational research; reforming intellectual property rights for job-related scientific achievements through empowerment and asset management reforms; and reshaping evaluation systems to move beyond traditional metrics toward quality, contribution, and impact. These measures aim to build a comprehensive institutional framework supporting the development of new quality productive forces and China's modernization of its industrial system.
Summary: The article emphasizes that strengthening the Party's political construction requires officials to enhance their ability to analyze and solve problems from a political perspective. It cites Xi Jinping's call for cadres to discern political essence and grasp fundamental issues, while also referencing Mao Zedong's view that politics is key to all matters. The piece stresses that economic issues are inherently political, and officials must prioritize Party leadership, the socialist system, and central authority. It outlines practical requirements such as understanding the broader political situation, recognizing political factors, implementing political demands, achieving political outcomes, and preventing political risks. Finally, it urges cadres to continuously cultivate these skills through rigorous training and practice.
Summary: The article emphasizes that artificial intelligence is a new engine for global economic growth and an accelerator for transitioning between old and new growth drivers, moving from the "digital world" to the "physical world." It advocates seizing this historic opportunity by encouraging open-source, open, and collaborative sharing to comprehensively boost AI innovation, industrial development, and application scenarios. The piece calls for coordinated efforts to upgrade traditional industries, cultivate emerging ones, and make forward-looking plans for future industries. The overarching goal is to empower all sectors with AI. No specific officials or U.S.-related topics were mentioned in the provided text.
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Summary: The article elaborates on the "New Development Concepts" (innovation, coordination, green, open, and sharing) first proposed by Chinese leader Xi Jinping in 2015, framing them as the core guiding principles for China's upcoming "15th Five-Year Plan" period and its path to Chinese-style modernization. It argues these concepts are essential for solving unbalanced development issues, surpassing flawed Western development models, and serving as the "baton" for high-quality growth. The piece outlines five strategic priorities—technological self-reliance, regional coordination, ecological harmony, high-level opening-up, and common prosperity—alongside implementation tactics emphasizing systemic thinking and problem-solving. In addressing foreign affairs, it criticizes certain countries (implicitly the U.S.) for "decoupling and breaking chains," while positioning China as open to the world and welcoming other nations to share its development opportunities.
Summary: The article, written by a researcher from Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology, argues that universities must strengthen ideological-political (思政) education courses in line with a February 2026 national work conference. It proposes three key directions: building a comprehensive curriculum system centered on Xi Jinping Thought, advancing the integration of this theory with "two combinations" (Marxism with Chinese practice and traditional culture), and fostering innovation in teaching methods. The piece emphasizes upgrading teacher quality through strict political and moral vetting, alongside enhanced teaching and research capabilities. It calls for creating a layered curriculum spanning undergraduate, master's, and doctoral levels, blending coursework with practical and digital learning environments. The author stresses that these reforms aim to transform ideological courses from knowledge delivery into value cultivation and belief reinforcement for students.
Summary: The article, citing Xi Jinping, argues that the CCP's unique trait of "daring and being skilled in struggle" has been central to its 105-year history, from its founding amid crises to overcoming challenges today. It distinguishes between "daring to struggle" (courage, political resolve, and bottom-line thinking) and "being skilled in struggle" (pragmatism, strategy, and balancing principle with flexibility), using examples like the Long March and the Korean War. The piece concludes that combining both elements is essential for the Party to maintain strategic initiative and achieve national rejuvenation amid current risks. No U.S. or U.S.-China relations are discussed.
Summary: The article traces the history of Chinese rare book collections at Cambridge University Library, beginning with sporadic acquisitions in the 17th century and expanding significantly with the 1886 donation of 883 works by former British minister to China Thomas Wade. Subsequent growth included purchases and gifts through the 20th century, forming a mature research collection by the 1970s under curator Piet van der Loon. The library now holds about 300,000 Chinese volumes, including over 2,000 core rare items, many dating before 1912. It also highlights collections in college libraries and the Needham Research Institute, which houses Joseph Needham's personal library of nearly 700 Chinese thread-bound books. The article emphasizes these holdings as material evidence of Sino-British cultural exchange and academic interaction.
Summary: The article summarizes the Tang dynasty text *食疗本草* (Dietary Materia Medica), authored by physician Meng Shen and supplemented by his disciple Zhang Ding, which is China's earliest surviving treatise on food therapy. It highlights core principles including the equal emphasis on prevention and treatment, dietary moderation, adapting food choices to individual constitution, season, and region, and using foods to nourish the organs. The text records 227 medicinal food items with their properties, effects, and contraindications, reflecting the traditional concept of medicine and food sharing a common origin. The author, a researcher at the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences' Institute for the History of Chinese Medicine and Medical Literature, argues these ancient dietary principles remain relevant for addressing modern chronic disease and imbalanced diets. No mention is made of the United States or U.S.-China relations.
Summary: The article expounds on ancient Chinese governance principles rooted in the Shang Dynasty founding edict "Tang Gao," emphasizing that officials must diligently serve the people's welfare. It argues that popular support determines regime stability, citing historical examples from the Duke of Zhou to Confucian thinkers who viewed the people as the foundation of the state. The piece highlights exemplary rulers and officials—Emperor Taizong of Tang, Ming founder Zhu Yuanzhang, and Qing official Zheng Banqiao—who prioritized agricultural relief and efficient administration during crises. It stresses that enduring governance requires sustained effort over immediate results, as demonstrated by Li Bing's multi-year construction of the Dujiangyan irrigation system. The overarching message is that virtuous, persistent, people-centered administration remains the timeless standard for Chinese statecraft.
Summary: Li Xiaoqiang, Vice President of the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences, responded to a question from Song Xiaowei of Zhongyuan University of Technology on improving the quality of independent talent cultivation, framing it as essential for national security and Chinese modernization. He argued that self-reliance in talent development is a strategic necessity given external risks, including U.S.-led technology blockades and "decoupling" targeting China's key technology sectors. Li emphasized that education must serve as the foundational and forward-looking pillar linking technological innovation with talent cultivation, requiring coordinated reforms across basic, higher, vocational, and continuing education. He called for aligning academic programs with national strategic needs, strengthening integrated training of top innovators, deepening industry-academia-research collaboration, and reforming evaluation systems to prioritize innovation capability over rigid indicators. The response underscored that independent talent cultivation must proceed within open cooperation to secure China's development initiative and support high-level technological self-reliance.
Summary: The article, authored by the Director of Jiangsu Province's Finance Department, outlines how party and government agencies should implement fiscal austerity to benefit the people, following President Xi Jinping's directive that the government tightening its belt serves the people's well-being. The piece emphasizes three core strategies: resolutely rejecting waste and extravagance, skillfully supporting development and livelihood priorities, and boldly pursuing fiscal sustainability through scientific management. Specific measures include tightening controls on administrative spending, cutting ineffective investments, reforming budget allocation through zero-based budgeting, and enhancing fiscal revenue through asset revitalization and market mechanisms. The article stresses that the goal is not merely to spend less but to spend wisely, ensuring public funds are channeled into people's most pressing needs. No mention is made of the United States or U.S.-China relations.
Summary: The Ministry of Natural Resources published an article announcing that China's Ecological Environment Code, the country's second law to bear the "Code" designation, will take effect on August 15, 2026, framing it as a major legal achievement in implementing Xi Jinping's thought on ecological civilization. The Code systematizes natural resource protection institutions into law, covering unified ownership of state-owned natural resources, territorial spatial planning, land and resource monitoring, property rights management, and cultivated land protection. The Ministry outlines plans to optimize territorial spatial development patterns, strengthen natural resource asset management, advance trilateral protection of cultivated land (quantity, quality, and ecology), enhance mineral resource exploration and green development, expand marine development and protection, and coordinate ecological restoration projects. The article emphasizes using "good laws and good governance" to protect natural resources and promote high-quality economic and social development through high-level ecological protection during the 15th Five-Year Plan period.
Summary: The article, authored by the head of the National Data Development Research Institute, defines the "token economy" (词元经济) as a new economic form centered on the production, circulation, and application of tokens—the fundamental semantic units for AI models—and argues it represents the highest-innovation, fastest-iterating, and most industrially impactful segment of the intelligent economy. It reports that China's daily token calls have surged from 100 billion in early 2024 to over 500 trillion by June 2026, and that local governments, including Guangdong (which issued the first provincial-level policy) and Hangzhou, are accelerating strategic deployments. The article identifies key challenges, including insufficient high-quality data supply, infrastructure upgrades, and lagging market regulation, while recommending policies to strengthen data, computing, network, and energy infrastructure, and to innovate governance mechanisms. It emphasizes the token's role as a universal measure for AI output, economic value, and settlement, and notes that its pricing is evolving toward tiered, value-based systems. The piece concludes by urging coordinated national efforts to convert China's data and scenario advantages into competitive strength in global AI development.
Summary: The article argues that modern air defense must shift from platform-centric approaches to system-of-systems integration to counter evolving threats from hypersonic, stealth, and drone swarm attacks. It outlines three priorities: redefining mission sets to address full-domain, precision, soft-kill, and saturation threats; building capabilities in全域 networking, distributed operations, rapid reorganization, agility, hybrid countermeasures, and sustainment; and focusing efforts on integrated command structures, information networks, and weapon platforms. The piece emphasizes leveraging system effects to achieve "1+1>2" synergy across services and domains. No specific officials, statements, or U.S.-China references are included in the article.
Summary: The article describes the Ersi (二四式) Maxim heavy machine gun displayed at the Military Museum of the Chinese People's Revolution, tracing its lineage from late Qing "Sai Dian Qiang" imports to its 1935 standardization at the Jinling Arsenal, with over 35,000 units produced by 1948. It highlights the severe firepower disparity between Chinese and Japanese forces during the War of Resistance, noting that a Chinese "German-equipped" division had 72 machine guns while a Japanese division had 98, and early Eighth Route Army units had only about 100 total. To address ammunition shortages, the八路军 established the Huangyadong Arsenal in 1939 in the Taihang Mountains, where workers improvised acid distillation equipment from pickle vats, recycled shell casings and scrap metal, and hand-repaired parts to keep guns operational. The article emphasizes that the Chinese military compensated for technical inferiority through strict ammunition conservation (requiring all shell casings be returned for reloading), night and close-quarter asymmetric tactics, and the collective sacrifice of soldiers and civilians. It concludes that the gun symbolizes China's self-reliance and united spirit against invasion, from the late Qing era through the anti-Japanese struggle.
Summary: President Xi Jinping, at the National Science and Technology Awards Conference and other major science meetings, stressed the need to align scientific innovation supply with industrial demand, promoting integrated innovation across industry, academia, and research to accelerate the transformation of technology into real productive forces. The article, authored by the Party Secretary of the Chinese Academy of Science and Technology for Development, outlines four key policy dimensions: streamlining the path from existing technologies to industrial application via concept verification centers and pilot testing platforms; strengthening enterprises' role as innovation leaders by enhancing their capacity to propose research questions and increasing basic research investment; deepening reform of intellectual property rights for job-related scientific achievements through empowerment and asset single-management systems; and reforming evaluation systems to support collaborative innovation among universities, research institutes, and enterprises. The piece emphasizes that these interconnected measures—covering outcomes, actors, incentives, and ecosystems—are essential for developing new quality productive forces and building a modern industrial system.
Summary: Ningbo is leveraging its port advantages to build a "dual circulation" strategic hub, serving China's new development paradigm through integrated development of port, industry, city, culture, and people. The article cites President Xi Jinping's March 2020 instruction that the Ningbo-Zhoushan Port is a "hardcore" force in national strategies including the Belt and Road Initiative, and should be built into a world-class strong port. In 2025, the port's cargo throughput reached 1.432 billion tons, ranking first globally for 17 consecutive years, while the Ningbo area of the Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone has rolled out 295 institutional innovations. Experts at a recent symposium emphasized that coastal ports must transcend mere logistics functions to become global resource allocation hubs, with Ningbo deepening cooperation with Shanghai on shipping, institutional opening, and cross-sea infrastructure. The city is advancing institutional opening aligned with RCEP, CPTPP, and DEPA standards, while promoting "AI+" manufacturing and cultivating 119 national single-champion enterprises.
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By: 自然资源部党组
The Ecological Environment Code of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Ecological Environment Code) officially came into effect on August 15, 2026. This is the second law in China named with the title "Code," and it is of great and far-reaching significance for implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization and accelerating the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature. The Ecological Environment Code systematizes and legalizes the major systems for the protection and utilization of natural resources, setting the legal benchmark and consolidating the legal foundation for natural resource work in the new era. The natural resources system will continue to study, publicize, and implement the Ecological Environment Code well, safeguard natural resources through good laws and good governance, continuously improve the governance system and enhance governance capacity, and promote high-quality economic and social development through high-level protection.
Deeply understand the great significance of implementing the Ecological Environment Code
General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized that we must always adhere to protecting the ecological environment with the strictest systems and the most rigorous rule of law. We must deeply grasp the core essence of the Ecological Environment Code and effectively improve the quality and level of its implementation.
The Ecological Environment Code is a major achievement of rule of law in implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization. The entire Ecological Environment Code implements Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization, takes comprehensively advancing the construction of a Beautiful China and accelerating the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature as its goals, and transforms core concepts such as "lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets" and "harmony between humanity and nature" into legal principles and institutional norms, ensuring that ecological civilization construction always advances in the correct direction.
The Ecological Environment Code comprehensively improves the system of laws and institutions for ecological civilization with Chinese characteristics. The Ecological Environment Code adopts a moderate codification model, systematically integrates separate laws and regulations in the ecological environment field and the natural resources field, resolves governance difficulties such as fragmented legislation, conflicting norms, and fragmented supervision, and forms an ecological environment rule-of-law pattern that is logically unified, clearly hierarchical, and synergistically efficient. The Ecological Environment Code has a dedicated chapter on the protection and sustainable utilization of natural resources, clarifying the legal institutional basis for handling the relationship between development and protection and promoting high-quality development through high-level protection.
The Ecological Environment Code provides strong rule-of-law safeguards for natural resources departments to perform their core responsibilities of "two unifications." The Ecological Environment Code codifies in legal form the major systems in the natural resources field since the new era, including the unified exercise by the Ministry of Natural Resources of the owner's responsibilities for state-owned natural resources assets, the unified exercise of responsibilities for territorial spatial use controls and ecological protection and restoration for all national land, as well as territorial spatial planning, natural resources survey and monitoring, unified confirmation and registration of natural resources rights, property rights management of natural resources assets, cultivated land protection, ecological protection and restoration, and national natural resources inspection, providing safeguards for consolidating the legal foundation of natural resources.
Accurately grasp the new situation and new requirements for high-level protection and utilization of natural resources
Since the establishment of the Ministry of Natural Resources, it has always deeply practiced Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization and Xi Jinping Thought on the Rule of Law, seriously studied and implemented General Secretary Xi Jinping's important instructions and directives on natural resources work, firmly established and practiced the concept that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets, continuously improved the natural resources management system, continuously optimized the territorial spatial pattern, implemented protection and restoration of important ecosystems, comprehensively improved resource utilization efficiency, and strived to be a good "steward" of natural resources and guardian of a Beautiful China. First, the natural resources foundation has become more solid. The red line of 1.8 billion mu of cultivated land has been firmly maintained, and a "trinity" protection pattern of quantity, quality, and ecology has initially taken shape. The target tasks for strategic mineral prospecting during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period have been fully completed, with 398 new medium and large-scale strategic mineral deposits (oil and gas fields) discovered. The national marine gross product has exceeded 11 trillion yuan. The forest coverage rate has increased to 25.09%, and the total output value of the forest-grass industry has reached 11 trillion yuan. The first batch of 5 national parks including Sanjiangyuan was established, and the Huangyan Island National Nature Reserve was newly established. Since the launch of the three landmark battles of the "Three-North" project, construction tasks exceeding 200 million mu have been completed. Second, the quality and efficiency of natural resources management have continuously improved. Adhering to optimizing increments and revitalizing stock, during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, the construction land use area per unit of GDP decreased by 19.36%. Strengthening the conservation and comprehensive utilization of mineral resources, more than 5,500 green mines above the provincial level have been built. Continuously improving the convenience of real estate registration, more than 2,300 counties and cities have implemented "Internet + real estate registration," "transfer with existing mortgage," and "delivery of houses with certificates," and confirmation and registration of natural resources rights has been completed for more than 3,800 key areas. Strengthening the supply of spatiotemporal data elements, a preliminary 3D real-scene China has been built, a national network of satellite navigation and positioning reference stations has been completed and put into operation, and the National Geospatial Information Public Service Platform (Tianditu) has an average daily service call volume exceeding 1 billion times. Third, the natural resources rule-of-law system has become more complete. Promoting the formulation and revision of laws and regulations such as the Land Administration Law and its implementing regulations, the Mineral Resources Law and its implementing regulations, the National Park Law, and the Nature Reserve Regulations, continuously improving the level of rule-of-law governance of natural resources.
The "15th Five-Year Plan" period is a critical period for consolidating the foundation and comprehensively exerting efforts to basically realize socialist modernization, and it is also an important period for comprehensively improving the level of natural resources protection and utilization and promoting high-quality economic and social development through high-level protection. First, greater emphasis is placed on optimizing the development pattern. Improving the main functional zone strategy and its institutional system, deepening the "multi-plan integration" reform, and promoting the formation of a spatial development pattern with effective main functional constraints and orderly territorial development. Second, greater emphasis is placed on efficient allocation of resource elements. Deepening the reform of factor markets, improving factor market systems and rules, comprehensively ascertaining the baseline of stock resources and assets, and revitalizing and utilizing stock resources. Third, greater emphasis is placed on comprehensive green transformation. Adhering to integrated protection and systematic governance of mountains, waters, forests, farmlands, grasslands, and deserts, improving ecological protection mechanisms, placing greater emphasis on improving quality, revitalizing industries, and benefiting the people, and building a major pattern of protection and governance from mountaintops to the ocean. Fourth, greater emphasis is placed on resource security. Consolidating the basic safeguards for national security, ensuring the security of food, energy resources, important industrial chains and supply chains, and major infrastructure, and strengthening the exploration, development, and reserve of strategic mineral resources.
Deeply implement the Ecological Environment Code and promote major progress in high-level protection and utilization of natural resources
Continuously optimize the territorial spatial development pattern. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts are focused on strengthening the main functional zone strategy, improving the territorial spatial planning system, and strengthening coordinated governance of territorial space. First, deeply implement the main functional zone strategy. Promote pilot implementation of the main functional zone system in typical regions, forming a batch of institutional achievements with strong operability that can be replicated and promoted. Research and formulate a national plan for optimizing the main functional zone strategy, promote the formation of several comprehensive spatial development units, and promote deep integration of major national strategies. Second, improve the territorial spatial planning system. Give play to the foundational role of territorial spatial planning and strengthen the guiding and constraining role of territorial spatial planning over various special plans. Strengthen bottom-line control of spatial safety such as cultivated land and permanent basic farmland, ecological protection red lines, urban development boundaries, as well as green space system lines, water body protection lines, historical and cultural protection lines, and infrastructure construction control lines. Coordinate the needs of production, living, ecology, culture, and safety, continuously improve urban functions, optimize urban spatial structure and layout, improve urban-rural living environments, and support high-quality urban development. Third, build "one map" for natural resources management and territorial spatial planning. Fully implement the requirements of "unified base map, unified standards, unified planning, and unified platform," coordinate and balance the spatial needs of various territorial spatial development, protection, and construction activities on the "one map," and lay a solid foundation for building a digital ecological civilization and a digital China. Comprehensively strengthen coordinated governance of territorial space, and establish and improve territorial spatial use control and planning permit systems that cover all territorial types with unified and connected coverage.
Comprehensively strengthen natural resources asset management. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, with improving the property rights system for natural resources assets as the main line, efforts are focused on ascertaining the baseline of natural resources, improving the institutional system, and promoting efficient allocation. First, advance unified survey and monitoring, confirmation and registration of rights, and asset inventory, statistics, and accounting. Improve the unified survey and monitoring and evaluation system covering all types of natural resources and territorial spaces such as national parks. Expand the scope of confirmation and registration of natural resources rights, consolidate the achievements of the unified real estate registration reform, and deepen the widespread application of registration achievements in natural resources asset management. Improve the natural resources asset inventory, statistics, and accounting system, establish an accounting technical standard system, calculate both the economic account and the ecological account, and comprehensively grasp the baseline of natural resources assets. Second, improve the natural resources asset management institutional system. Formulate management measures for the list of rights of state-owned natural resources assets owned by the whole people. Improve the systems for compensated use, trading, and price management of natural resources assets. Explore the compilation of natural resources asset allocation plans and promote combined allocation of natural resources assets. Strengthen coordination between resource asset allocation plans and territorial spatial planning and use control systems, and adapt to local conditions to expand the paths for realizing the value of ecological products in the natural resources field. Third, vigorously promote the revitalization and utilization of stock land. Establish a planning and policy system more conducive to promoting the revitalization of stock land and inefficient land, implement precise policies to revitalize stock real estate land, and deeply advance the revitalization and utilization of stock land and inefficient land. Fourth, strengthen supervision of natural resources assets. Establish a unified system for managing income from state-owned natural resources assets owned by the whole people. Strengthen whole-process supervision of natural resources protection and utilization, and continuously advance natural resources inspection and law enforcement. Explore assessment and evaluation of entities performing duties for natural resources assets. Improve the unified reporting system for natural resources assets.
Deeply advance the "trinity" protection of cultivated land. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts are focused on the quantity, quality, and ecological protection of cultivated land. First, stabilize the quantity of cultivated land. Based on natural geographical conditions and regional characteristics, implement differentiated management and control by region and category. Expand cultivated land sources through multiple channels, guide orchards, woodlands, grasslands, and other land suitable for restoration to high-quality cultivated land as supplementary sources, and gradually incorporate high-quality cultivated land formed historically in forest and pastoral areas that can be stably utilized for a long time into the scope of cultivated land protection. Second, improve the quality of cultivated land. Compile and implement special plans for cultivated land protection and greening of territorial space, and coordinate and optimize the spatial layout of agricultural land. Improve the management mechanism for optimizing permanent basic farmland by replacing inferior plots with superior ones, and continuously increase the proportion of high-quality cultivated land within permanent basic farmland. Strengthen the protection of black soil and the treatment of acidified cultivated land, and promote the comprehensive utilization of saline-alkali land. Third, improve the ecology of cultivated land. Promote the coordinated advancement of cultivated land development and utilization and ecological protection, strengthen systematic governance of surrounding forests, grasslands, wetlands, and sandy lands, and implement green farming. Advance the construction of farmland shelterbelts, and strictly prevent the reclamation of cultivated land by destroying forests, grasslands, and wetlands.
Vigorously strengthen the protection and utilization of mineral resources. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts are focused on mineral resources exploration and development, green development of the mining industry, and deepening reform. First, strengthen the exploration, development, and reserve of strategic mineral resources. Improve the system for coordinating and linking the exploration, production, supply, storage, and marketing of strategic mineral resources, and consolidate and enhance the position and competitiveness of the mining industry in the global industrial division of labor. Increase the coverage rate of regional geological surveys and mineral resources surveys, and promote stable and increased production of energy resources. Increase mineral deposit reserves and implement reserve exploration. Second, promote the comprehensive utilization of mineral resources and green development of the mining industry. Strengthen high-quality and efficient comprehensive utilization of important strategic minerals, advance green exploration and green mine construction, and make green the distinctive background of mining industry development. Third, deepen the reform of mineral resources management. Improve incentive mechanisms for prospecting, optimize the methods for transferring mining rights, explore the establishment of exploration risk funds, create a fair and transparent market environment, and stimulate the vitality of various business entities.
Continuously strengthen ocean development, utilization, and protection. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts are focused on innovation-driven development, efficient coordination, industrial renewal, harmony between people and the sea, and win-win cooperation. First, advance innovation-driven development. Coordinate the construction of innovation platforms and major scientific and technological infrastructure in the marine field, plan and implement major national science and technology projects, strengthen basic research in marine science, and accelerate the efficient transformation and application of marine scientific and technological achievements. Second, advance efficient coordination. Adhere to land-sea coordination and mountain-sea linkage, plan nearshore, open ocean, deep sea, and polar regions as a whole, and improve the overall efficiency of the marine economy. Third, advance industrial renewal. Vigorously develop emerging marine industries, promote the large-scale utilization of marine energy and seawater desalination, make forward-looking arrangements for deep-sea industries, marine digital economy, and new marine materials industries, and build a modern marine industrial system. Fourth, advance harmony between people and the sea. Strengthen classified protection of coastlines and control of the natural coastline retention rate. Coordinate the promotion of high-level protection and high-quality development of islands. Deepen the construction of marine ecological early warning and monitoring systems and comprehensive marine disaster prevention systems. Fifth, advance win-win cooperation. Actively participate in the formulation of international marine governance rules, deepen bilateral and multilateral marine cooperation, promote the new era Chinese marine culture, and promote the building of a maritime community with a shared future.
Coordinate the advancement of ecological protection and restoration. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts are focused on improving the scientific and professional level of ecological restoration. First, coordinate the implementation of major ecological protection and restoration projects. Focusing on the major regions of the "three zones and four belts" ecological security barriers, coordinate the implementation of integrated protection and restoration projects for mountains, waters, forests, farmlands, grasslands, and deserts. Strengthen mine ecological restoration and governance, strengthen ecological protection and restoration of key sea areas, and advance the construction of blue bays, beautiful beaches, and harmonious islands. Fight the "Three-North" project battle well and promote the three landmark battles to achieve decisive victories. Second, comprehensively advance the construction of a nature reserve system with national parks as the main body. Build national parks with high quality and establish new national parks in an orderly manner. Implement integration and optimization of nature reserves. Build a national botanical garden system. Strengthen the protection of flagship species and biodiversity. Third, continuously improve ecological restoration standards, norms, and supervision and management systems. Implement the requirements of the Ecological Environment Code on improving the scientific and professional level of ecological restoration, and accelerate the promotion and application of the standard system and technologies. Strengthen ecological restoration supervision and improve the whole-life-cycle project management system.
Natural resources are the material foundation, spatial carrier, and energy source of economic and social development. The implementation of the Ecological Environment Code has laid a solid legal foundation for the safe, efficient, and sustainable utilization of natural resources and the preservation and appreciation of assets. We will carry out in-depth study and publicity, effectively promote the high-quality implementation of the Ecological Environment Code, safeguard lucid waters and lush mountains, and escort a Beautiful China.
Return to TopBy: 刘冬梅
General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized at the National Science and Technology Awards Conference, the Conference of Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Chinese Academy of Engineering, and the Eleventh National Congress of the China Association for Science and Technology that it is necessary to highlight the supply of scientific and technological innovation and the traction of industrial demand, promote industry-university-research integrated innovation, and open up the channel for science and technology to accelerate its transformation into real productive forces. This important exposition reveals the dialectical law of the interaction between the supply of scientific and technological innovation and the traction of industrial demand, and points the way for promoting the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation and accelerating the development of new quality productive forces. In recent years, the scale of transformation of scientific and technological achievements in China has continued to expand. To truly convert this scale advantage into a quality advantage in real productive forces, it is still necessary to make coordinated efforts in such links as smoothing the achievement chain, strengthening the main actors, improving incentives, and building the ecosystem.
Accelerating the transformation and application of existing technologies to industry, and smoothing the path for science and technology to transform into real productive forces
The Outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan makes explicit arrangements for the construction of concept verification centers and pilot-scale verification platforms. In 2024, 4,059 universities and research institutes in China transformed scientific and technological achievements through transfer, licensing, equity investment, technology development, consulting, services, and other means, with total contract value reaching 226.91 billion yuan, reflecting that the transformation potential of universities and research institutes continues to be released. At the same time, it must also be recognized that for existing technological achievements to move from the laboratory to scaled production, they must cross the key links of concept verification and pilot-scale verification, which is the key lever for avoiding transformation risks at the source.
Build concept verification centers to cross the transformation starting point. The first gateway for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements is the leap from scientific discovery to technically feasible principles and commercially viable logic. Some research results remain stranded in the laboratory for a long time, with the root cause being the lack of a dedicated link for systematic verification of market prospects, business models, and technical feasibility. Concept verification centers, through professional evaluation and feasibility verification, transform abstract research output into decision-ready seed projects. It is necessary to make coordinated arrangements around key fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum technology, biomedicine, and new materials, focusing on the bottlenecks and blockages of the innovation chain and industrial chain, to build concept verification centers. At the same time, establish a linkage mechanism between concept verification centers and pilot-scale verification platforms, forming an interlocking front-end chain of transformation.
Build pilot-scale verification platforms to cross the "valley of death" of achievement transformation. Between prototype samples and scaled production, there is an intermediate zone characterized by large investment, high risk, and long cycles, which is the segment where achievement transformation failures are most concentrated. Achievements that have not undergone pilot-scale verification generally have a low success rate when directly industrialized. Pilot-scale verification platforms are not only physical carriers for engineering verification, but also key hubs for the solidification of technical processes, the downward shift of cost curves, and the front-loading of market connection, determining the success or failure of the subsequent industrialization path. It is necessary to encourage enterprises to take the lead and universities and research institutes to participate in jointly building pilot-scale production lines, and to promote the layout of a number of industry-representative pilot-scale verification platforms in fields such as new materials and biomedicine. It is necessary to explore diversified support models such as "post-reward," "pilot-scale loans," and "appropriation-to-investment conversion," establish rules for open sharing toward small, medium, and micro enterprises, and allow more laboratory achievements to move to the workshop floor through the pilot-scale channel.
Use the full chain of science and technology finance to connect the transformation pathway. Every link in the achievement transformation chain corresponds to funding needs of different natures, different maturities, and different risk appetites. The early-stage links have high risk and great uncertainty, the mid-stage links require large investment and slow recovery, and the later-stage links are closer to marketization. The essence of the current construction of the science and technology financial service system lies in allocating financial resources according to the laws of achievement transformation, matching policy tools according to the nature of risks, and forming a financial support system covering the entire process from concept verification to industrialization. It is necessary to further implement the 15 policy measures in the "Several Policy Measures for Accelerating the Construction of a Science and Technology Financial System to Strongly Support High-Level Scientific and Technological Self-Reliance and Self-Improvement," and make good use of the science and technology innovation and technological transformation relending quota expanded from 500 billion yuan to 1.2 trillion yuan. It is necessary to give play to the guiding role of the National Venture Capital Guidance Fund in investing early, investing small, investing long-term, and investing in hard technology, cultivate and strengthen patient capital, improve the "appropriation-insurance-loan-investment" linked support system, and let the "living water" of finance drip precisely along the achievement transformation chain.
Improving the ability to pose problems and strengthening the position of enterprises as the main actors in scientific and technological innovation
The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China emphasized strengthening the position of enterprises as the main actors in scientific and technological innovation, giving play to the leading and supporting role of science and technology-based backbone enterprises, and creating a favorable environment for the growth of science and technology-based small, medium, and micro enterprises. Its core lies in improving enterprises' ability to pose problems, so that the real problems of industry become the main battlefield of national scientific and technological research.
Consolidate the foundation of innovation actors with the advantage of enterprise R&D investment. In 2025, total expenditure on research and experimental development (R&D) reached 3,926.2 billion yuan, with a ratio to GDP of 2.80%, for the first time exceeding the average level of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, with enterprises accounting for more than 77% of R&D expenditure. This shows that the pattern of Chinese enterprises as the main force of R&D investment is basically stable, and the trend of innovation resources concentrating toward enterprises continues to strengthen. To consolidate and expand the advantage of enterprise R&D investment, the key lies in converting the advantage of investment scale into an advantage of output efficiency. It is necessary to improve the R&D reserve fund system, regulate the formation, use, and management of R&D reserve funds, and guide science and technology leading enterprises to invest reserve funds primarily in forward-looking and basic research directions.
Improve enterprises' ability to pose problems through basic research investment. The strength of enterprises' ability to pose problems fundamentally depends on the level of basic research investment. Only by deeply cultivating basic frontiers can enterprises pose genuine questions with original value that lead the future of industry. In 2025, China's basic research expenditure reached 277.8 billion yuan, with its share of R&D expenditure rising to 7.08%, a record high, but there remains a considerable gap compared with developed countries. Central enterprises, through means such as establishing joint funds and taking the lead in building national key laboratories, deeply participate in the construction of the national basic research system. In 2025, basic research investment by central enterprises exceeded 100 billion yuan for the first time. It is necessary to take central state-owned enterprises as the lead, drive more science and technology leading enterprises to treat basic research as strategic investment, expand the proportion of entrepreneur and expert participation in the preparation of guidelines for national key R&D programs, and give industrial demand a front-loaded voice in the formulation of national science and technology strategy.
Systematically improve enterprises' ability to pose problems, answer problems, and grade papers through institutional construction. Enterprises bear the triple role of problem-poser, problem-answerer, and paper-grader, running through the entire process of scientific and technological innovation, which is the concrete expression of enterprises' position as innovation main actors. To establish and implement this role positioning, the key lies in using institutional arrangements to carry enterprises' demand-side voice through the project initiation, organization, and evaluation links of scientific and technological research. It is necessary to support science and technology leading enterprises in taking the lead in undertaking major national science and technology projects and key R&D programs, laying out systematic and mission-oriented innovation consortia in key fields such as integrated circuits and industrial mother machines, and clarifying the intellectual property ownership and benefit distribution mechanisms of innovation consortia. Support enterprises in leading the project initiation and acceptance of application-oriented science and technology projects, evaluate scientific and technological achievements with market demand and industrial value as the core, and simultaneously build a two-way collaboration relationship between schools and enterprises, so that the industrial demand side and the science and technology supply side form a stable docking channel.
Promoting the empowerment reform and separate asset management of job-related scientific and technological achievements, and continuously improving incentive mechanisms
The "Decision" of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China explicitly deploys deepening the empowerment reform of job-related scientific and technological achievements, establishing a separate asset management system for job-related scientific and technological achievements, and allowing scientific and technical personnel greater autonomy in the distribution of income from the transformation of scientific and technological achievements. Job-related scientific and technological achievements have such special characteristics as strong time sensitivity, rapid changes in value, and limited transformation windows. If not transformed in a timely manner, their value will shrink substantially. The essence of empowerment reform and separate management is to liberate scientific and technological achievements from the rigid framework of traditional state-owned asset management, and to give scientific researchers stable expectations and full autonomy.
Use separate management to return to the factor attribute of scientific and technological achievements. Job-related scientific and technological achievements differ from ordinary state-owned assets in that their value realization is highly dependent on actual transformation actions and market-oriented operating mechanisms. Some requirements of traditional state-owned asset management have a structural tension with the time-sensitivity requirements of achievement transformation. The institutional value of separate management lies precisely in establishing dedicated management rules for scientific and technological achievements, allowing asset management to return to the flow of innovation factors, and allowing scientific research institutions to dare to let achievements go to market. It is necessary to improve the special rules for the recognition, use, and disposal of scientific and technological achievement assets, and form evaluation, assessment, and supervision mechanisms that conform to the laws of innovation. It is necessary to formulate supporting operational guidelines for such links as asset appraisal, property rights registration, and disposal approval, so that separate management is transformed from a principled deployment into an operable and assessable institutional arrangement.
Use empowerment reform to solve the problem of not daring to transform and not being willing to transform. The core effectiveness of the empowerment reform pilot lies in providing scientific researchers with stable expectations through clear empowerment of ownership or long-term use rights, fundamentally resolving the wait-and-see mentality caused by ambiguous property rights attribution and uncertain income expectations. It is necessary to promote diversified empowerment models, gradually expand the coverage of empowerment reform, and clarify exemption circumstances and negative lists. Formulate operational guidelines for due diligence exemption in empowerment reform, detailing specific matters such as the definition of diligent and conscientious performance, exemption circumstances, and determination procedures, so that scientific research institutions and scientific researchers have clear expectations and boundaries. Implement the model of confirming rights before transformation, support the division and confirmation of rights between the achievement-owning unit and the completers, and allow scientific researchers to obtain reasonable returns commensurate with their contributions in achievement transformation.
Use professional services to solve the problem of not knowing how to transform. Empowerment reform activates property rights incentives, but whether property rights incentives can truly be realized also depends on the professional intermediary capacity for achievements to reach the market. Scientific researchers are good at innovation but not necessarily at market-oriented operations. The technical value of scientific and technological achievements does not naturally equate to commercial value. The professional service system connecting the supply and demand ends of achievements is the key support for realizing the effectiveness of empowerment reform, and is also a relatively lagging link in the current reform process. It is necessary to expand the team of high-level technology managers, improve institutional norms such as professional qualifications and training certification, and establish a professional title sequence for technology managers with matching compensation incentive arrangements. Technology managers are an important bond connecting the supply and demand ends of achievements and promoting achievement transformation. The expansion of the team bears on whether empowered achievements can truly be implemented and produce results. It is necessary to simultaneously implement the model of use before payment, encourage universities and research institutes to license the use of scientific and technological achievements to small, medium, and micro enterprises on a use-before-payment basis, and explore diversified payment methods such as zero threshold plus milestone payments.
Continuously improving the evaluation system and supporting collaborative innovation among universities, research institutes, and enterprises
The evaluation system is the key to stimulating collaborative innovation. Wherever the "baton" of evaluation points, talent and resources flow there. Evaluation reform is the key lever for leveraging the integrated reform of education, science and technology, and talent. Using evaluation reform as the traction to build a collaborative innovation ecosystem is the inherent requirement for promoting the coordinated linkage of various innovation actors.
Reshape the evaluation orientation by "breaking the four onlys" and "establishing new standards." The fundamental task of evaluation reform is to break the old inertia of only papers, only titles, only degrees, and only awards, and to establish new standards oriented toward quality, contribution, and performance. Breaking and establishing are two sides of the same coin: what is broken is simple quantification and mechanical benchmarking; what is established is classification by type and diversified value. At present, science and technology evaluation reform has achieved remarkable results in the construction of policy frameworks, but continuous efforts are still needed in the implementation of institutions and the construction of deeper mechanisms. It is necessary to resolutely "break the four onlys" and incorporate transformation effectiveness into the professional title evaluation, performance assessment, and discipline evaluation of innovation actors oriented toward applied research. It is necessary to improve the implementation rules for classified evaluation: basic research achievements are mainly evaluated by peer review, applied research achievements are mainly evaluated by industry users and social evaluation, and technology development and industrialization achievements are mainly evaluated by third-party market evaluation. Different types of achievements should all be able to find a matching evaluation yardstick.
Use classified evaluation to manifest the diversified value of scientific and technological achievements. The value of scientific and technological achievements is diversified and differentiated. A "one-size-fits-all" evaluation approach is detrimental both to the long-term accumulation of basic research and to the industrial docking of applied research. The deeper significance of classified evaluation lies in recognizing that scientific and technological achievements have different value forms and realization paths, guiding differentiated innovation behavior with differentiated evaluation logic, so that basic research is willing to sit on the cold bench and applied research dares to charge into the main battlefield. It is necessary to implement the framework of scientific, technological, economic, social, and cultural values in specific scenarios such as university evaluation, research institute assessment, and science and technology project acceptance, and to increase the weight of indicators for serving major national strategies and solving key core technologies in university evaluation. It is necessary to establish a classified evaluation mechanism for universities, encouraging different tracks to develop their own characteristics and levels, and avoiding homogeneous competition and resource misallocation.
Use two-way mobility of talent to build a collaborative ecosystem. The deep obstacles to collaborative innovation often lie not in the lack of willingness but in institutional and mechanism barriers. Talent mobility between universities, research institutes, and enterprises involves complex matters such as professional title articulation, social security transfer, achievement attribution, and compensation attribution, involving supporting reforms across multiple departments. Only by breaking down unit boundaries and establishing mutual recognition and sharing mechanisms can talent flow smoothly among different actors, and can collaborative innovation move from stage-by-stage cooperation to long-term ecosystem building. It is necessary to implement the "deputy technology director" system, selecting scientific researchers from universities and research institutes to serve as deputy technology directors in enterprises, helping enterprises refine and solve key technical problems. It is necessary to implement the "industry professor" system, selecting high-level enterprise talent to serve as industry professors in universities, participating in talent cultivation, discipline construction, and scientific research. It is necessary to formulate assessment and recognition standards and position appointment rules for "industry professors" and "deputy technology directors," and establish supporting mechanisms for evaluation mutual recognition and benefit sharing. It is necessary to let universities truly function as the hub of the integrated development of education, science and technology, and talent, and let the needs of enterprises as innovation main actors be truly transmitted to universities and research institutes.
The above four aspects are interconnected and mutually supportive. Accelerating the transformation of existing technologies to industry smooths the achievement chain; improving enterprises' ability to pose problems strengthens the innovation main actors; promoting the empowerment of job-related scientific and technological achievements activates property rights incentives; and improving the evaluation system builds a collaborative ecosystem. The four together point to the fundamental goal of deep integration of scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation, providing solid institutional support for developing new quality productive forces and building a modern industrial system. By coordinating the four dimensions of achievements, main actors, momentum, and ecosystem, and promoting institutional and mechanism reform with systematic thinking, the channel for science and technology to accelerate its transformation into real productive forces will continue to be unblocked, and the momentum for the development of new quality productive forces will continue to be abundant.
(The author is Secretary of the Party Committee of the Chinese Academy of Science and Technology for Development)
Return to TopBy: 周逢
When the party's political construction is implemented in cadre team building, it is necessary to continuously improve the ability of leading cadres at all levels, especially senior cadres, to grasp direction, grasp general trends, and grasp the overall situation, and to improve the ability to distinguish political right from wrong, maintain political resolve, manage the political situation, and prevent political risks. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out, "To improve political ability, a very important point is to be good at analyzing and solving problems from a political perspective. Only by analyzing problems from a political perspective can one see the essence clearly; only by solving problems from a political perspective can one grasp the fundamentals." This important exposition reveals the basic laws of Marxist party building and points out the direction and path for party members and cadres in the new era to enhance political awareness, improve political ability, and elevate political competence.
Our party is a Marxist party, and political attribute is the fundamental attribute of the party, which determines that party members and cadres must take a 旗帜鲜明 (qí zhì xiān míng - "banners and flags are bright and clear," to take a clear-cut stand) stand on politics and first analyze and solve problems from a political perspective. The lofty political ideals, noble political pursuits, pure political quality, and strict political discipline possessed by a Marxist party can only fully demonstrate their powerful strength when embodied in actions to solve specific problems. How party members and cadres analyze and solve problems not only reflects their ability and level, but also tests their positions and viewpoints. A qualified party member and cadre must accurately grasp the political direction, stand firmly on the political stance, adhere to political principles, and firmly follow the political path, and be good at thinking about and handling all aspects of work from a political height.
The economy is the foundation; politics is the concentrated reflection of the economy; the essence of economic problems is political problems. Mao Zedong pointed out, "The key to all problems lies in politics," clarifying that only by handling problems from a political height can various undertakings develop smoothly. General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized, "Reform, development, and stability; internal affairs, foreign affairs, and national defense; governing the party, governing the country, and governing the military - each and every one is politics, each and every one cannot be separated from politics." This points out that politics is the commander, the overall situation, and the direction, and stipulates the positions and principles of all other work. Only by viewing problems from a political perspective can one penetrate appearances and see clearly, understand clearly, and act clearly. When the party leads the people in governing the country, the most important thing is to handle various complex political relationships well and always maintain the correct political direction of the development of the party and the country's undertakings. For party members and cadres, upholding the party's leadership and the socialist system with Chinese characteristics, especially upholding the supreme principle of centralized, unified leadership of the Party Central Committee, advancing Chinese-style modernization (中国式现代化) as the greatest politics, and adhering to the people's standpoint as the fundamental political standpoint - all these are major political issues that must be firmly grasped. Facing complex situations and arduous tasks, only by starting from these major political issues can one see the essence through phenomena, understand the political considerations behind specific affairs, truly understand "why," "what," and "how to do it," and thus respond correctly.
To be good at analyzing and solving problems from a political perspective, one must keep the political overall situation in mind, grasp political factors, implement political requirements, achieve political effects, and prevent political risks. Keeping the political overall situation in mind means 审时度势 (shěn shí duó shì - "examine the times, measure the situation," to assess the situation) from an overall and strategic height, having a 了然于胸 (liǎo rán yú xiōng - "clear in the chest," to have a thorough understanding) of the "matters of national significance" (国之大者), always paying attention to what the Party Central Committee cares about and emphasizes, deeply understanding what are the most important interests of the party and the country and what positions most need to be firmly upheld, and consciously thinking about problems and doing work within the overall work of the party and the country. Grasping political factors means discovering political problems from ordinary affairs, detecting political signs from budding and tendency-type problems, grasping political logic from 错综复杂 (cuò zōng fù zá - "intertwined and complex," intricate and complicated) contradictory relationships, recognizing the political significance, political value, and political influence contained therein, accurately identifying the times and trends, dangers and opportunities, advantages and disadvantages, and seizing political initiative. Implementing political requirements means completely, accurately, and comprehensively studying and understanding the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speeches and important instructions, embodying the implementation of the Party Central Committee's major decisions and deployments in the practice of planning major strategies, formulating major policies, deploying major tasks, and advancing major work, frequently benchmarking against standards, and promptly correcting deviations. Achieving political effects means ensuring that the ultimate results of work are all reflected in fundamental aspects related to the future and destiny of the party and the country, such as upholding and strengthening the party's overall leadership, safeguarding national political security, maintaining the party's flesh-and-blood ties with the people, preserving the party's advanced nature and purity, and consolidating the party's long-term governing position. Preventing political risks means always maintaining a high degree of political vigilance and political sensitivity, studying, judging, and handling various risks and problems with a holistic, connected, and developmental perspective, insisting on preparing for the worst, making the greatest efforts, and striving for the best results, so as to prevent problems before they occur.
Being good at analyzing and solving problems from a political perspective is a political responsibility that party members and cadres must shoulder. It requires continuous forging and improvement through study and practice, raising the political standing, deepening understanding, enhancing consciousness, actively undergoing rigorous ideological tempering, political training, practical exercise, and professional training, continuously improving the actual ability and level of analyzing and solving problems from a political perspective, and implementing the requirement of taking a clear-cut stand on politics.
Return to TopAdhere to open cooperation and win-win outcomes, and drive innovative development. Artificial intelligence is a new engine for world economic growth and an accelerator for the transition between old and new drivers of growth, and it is moving from the "digital world" toward the "physical world." We must seize this rare historic opportunity, encourage open-source, openness, cooperation, and sharing, comprehensively promote scientific and technological innovation, industrial development, and scenario application of artificial intelligence, and coordinately advance the transformation and upgrading of traditional industries, the cultivation and strengthening of emerging industries, and the forward-looking layout of future industries, so that artificial intelligence empowers a thousand industries and ten thousand businesses.
Return to TopBy: 樊继达
Philosophy is the forerunner of action; whether the development philosophy is correct fundamentally determines the effectiveness and even the success or failure of development. At the Fifth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee held in October 2015, General Secretary Xi Jinping first proposed the new development philosophy of innovation, coordination, green, openness, and sharing, emphasizing that the new development philosophy is strategic, programmatic, and guiding in nature, and is the concentrated embodiment of development thinking, development direction, and development focus. Over the past decade and more, under the guidance of the new development philosophy, our country has effectively responded to various external shocks and internal difficulties, continuing to write new chapters in the miracle of rapid economic development. Entering the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, we must more consciously carry the new development philosophy through all fields and the entire process of economic and social development, respond to the uncertainty of the external environment with the certainty of high-quality development, and lay a more solid foundation for basically realizing socialist modernization.
Deeply grasp the importance of the new development philosophy in Chinese-style modernization
General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that since the 18th CPC National Congress, we have put forward many major theories and philosophies for economic and social development, among which the new development philosophy is the most important and primary. The new development philosophy is the core soul and action guide of Xi Jinping's economic thought, running through all aspects and all fields of Xi Jinping's economic thought.
The new development philosophy is a major theory and philosophy for grasping economic and social development in the new development stage. The new development philosophy is a core component of Xi Jinping's economic thought, originating from the objective reality that economic development is the foundation and key to solving various problems in our country. In the new historical stage of marching toward the second centenary goal, the goals we have established, the internal and external supporting conditions, and the principal social contradictions we face have all changed compared with the past, and the development philosophy and thinking must be adjusted accordingly. As one of the latest achievements in the Sinicization and modernization of Marxist political economy, the new development philosophy creatively answers major theoretical and practical questions such as the purpose, driving force, mode, and path of development, clarifies major political questions such as our Party's political stance, value orientation, development model, and development path regarding development, and plays an important role of strategic command and top-level guidance for Chinese-style modernization economic construction.
The new development philosophy is a major theory and philosophy leading high-quality development. The primary task of building a modern socialist country in all respects is high-quality development, which is the hard truth of the new era. General Secretary Xi Jinping clearly pointed out at the 2017 Central Economic Work Conference that high-quality development is development that can well satisfy the people's growing needs for a better life, is development that embodies the new development philosophy, and is development in which innovation becomes the first driving force, coordination becomes an endogenous characteristic, green becomes a universal form, openness becomes the necessary path, and sharing becomes the fundamental purpose. It can be seen from this that the new development philosophy and high-quality development are intrinsically unified; high-quality development must embody the new development philosophy, and the new development philosophy is the baton of high-quality development. Only by advocating innovation, emphasizing coordination, promoting green, deepening openness, and advancing sharing can such development be worthy of our pursuit and promotion.
The new development philosophy is a major theory and philosophy for solving the problem of unbalanced and insufficient development in our country. After long-term efforts, the level of social productive forces in our country has greatly improved, and the total economic volume has leapt to the forefront of the world, but the problem of unbalanced and insufficient development remains prominent, gaps in urban-rural regional development and income distribution still exist, and problems of incoordination and unsustainability in development still need to be solved. The new development philosophy has a distinct problem orientation, directly targeting various development bottlenecks and difficulties. It is not a partial patch to the original development model, but a reshaping of the overall development logic, realizing the transformation of development from "quantity" expansion to "quality" improvement, from single economic growth to comprehensive human development and overall social progress. To advance Chinese-style modernization, the new development philosophy is not an option but a necessity, not an expedient measure but a long-term strategy.
The new development philosophy is a major theory and philosophy proposed through deeply summarizing domestic and foreign development experience and lessons. After the end of World War II, a large number of newly independent countries followed Western development paradigms to advance industrialization and modernization, but the development results of the vast majority of countries did not meet expectations. Very few were able to cross the middle-income trap, and most fell into the predicament of economic weakening, social division, and ecological deterioration. Practice has shown that development theories and philosophies formed with Western developed countries as templates cannot fundamentally solve the development problems of developing countries. The new development philosophy breaks free from the inherent shackles of Western development theory, demonstrating the "China solution," contributing "Chinese wisdom," and providing the "Chinese choice" for those countries and nations in the world that both want to accelerate development and want to maintain their own independence.
Five dimensions of the new development philosophy leading Chinese-style modernization
The "15th Five-Year Plan" period has an important position of 承前启后 (chéng qián qǐ hòu - "inherit the past and open the future," serving as a link between past and future) in the process of basically realizing socialist modernization, and is a key period for consolidating the foundation and making comprehensive efforts. We must fully, accurately, and comprehensively implement the new development philosophy and promote major breakthroughs in strategic tasks related to the overall situation of Chinese-style modernization.
First, adhere to innovative development and achieve decisive progress in high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-strengthening. Innovation is the primary driving force leading development, and science and technology are the strategic support of Chinese-style modernization. During the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, the position of innovation as the primary driving force has become more prominent, and it is necessary to transform this "key variable" of scientific and technological innovation into the "maximum increment" of high-quality development. The 当务之急 (dāng wù zhī jí - "the urgent task of the moment") is to win the "assault battle" of key core technologies. Strengthen the national strategic scientific and technological strength, improve the new nationwide system for mobilizing resources, overcome "neck-jamming" (卡脖子) technologies, forge "accelerator" technologies, consolidate "moat" technologies, cultivate "trump card" (撒手锏) technologies, form more non-symmetric competitive advantages, and seize the commanding heights of future scientific and technological development. The long-term strategy is to fight the "protracted war" of basic research. Strengthen the overall planning and top-level design of basic research, clarify the main attack directions and key fields of basic research, and increase the proportion of science and technology expenditure used for basic research. The fundamental plan is to win the "competition" for innovative talents. Accelerate the building of strategic scientists, leading scientific and technological talents, and other national strategic talent forces. Continue to promote "breaking the 'five onlys'" (破五唯), and establish and improve a precise, differentiated talent evaluation system that fully reflects innovation capability and level according to local conditions (因地制宜, yīn dì zhì yí - "adapt measures to local conditions"). Create better conditions for young innovative talents so that young innovative talents can settle down, feel at ease, and be secure in their careers.
Second, adhere to coordinated development and achieve decisive progress in coordinated urban-rural and regional development. Coordination has multiple attributes of development means, development goals, and development evaluation yardsticks. Regional coordinated development is an inherent requirement of Chinese-style modernization. During the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, attention should be paid to giving play to the superimposed effects of the regional coordinated development strategy, major regional strategies, the main functional area strategy, and the new urbanization strategy, as well as the role of growth poles in key regions such as Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, and the Yangtze River Delta. Establish a regional economic layout and territorial space system with complementary advantages and high-quality development. Unblock the bottlenecks in the flow of factors and break down the barriers of regional segmentation. Deeply advance people-centered new urbanization, and steadily promote the urbanization of 250 million agricultural transfer populations who already work and live in cities. Based on the "two overall situations" (两个大局), firmly hold the bottom line of ensuring national food security, promote the two-way flow of urban and rural factors, solidly advance comprehensive rural revitalization, accelerate agricultural and rural modernization, and build a strong agricultural country.
Third, adhere to green development and achieve decisive progress in the harmonious coexistence of humanity and nature. Green development is the distinctive background of Chinese-style modernization. During the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, we must plan the overall development from the height of harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature, and deeply integrate the green development philosophy into the entire process of economy, society, and life. Continue to deeply fight the battle against pollution, improve the livability of urban and rural environments, and build a solid national ecological security barrier. Adhere to the "dual carbon" (双碳) traction, coordinately promote carbon reduction, pollution reduction, green expansion, and growth, improve the mechanism for realizing the value of ecological products, and enhance the momentum of green development. Improve the dual control system of total carbon emissions and intensity, and coordinate the planning and construction of a new energy system and a new power system. Accelerate the green and low-carbon transformation of the industrial structure and the green and low-carbon transformation of production methods and lifestyles.
Fourth, adhere to open development and achieve decisive progress in high-level opening up to the outside world. Chinese-style modernization is not a modernization of self-enclosure and self-isolation, but a modernization continuously expanded through opening up. At present, individual countries are desperately "withdrawing from groups," decoupling and breaking chains, hindering the development of latecomer countries, while we stand on the correct side of history, opening our arms to welcome all countries to ride on China's development "express train" and "convenient train," and actively seek more points of convergence of interests. Steadily expand institutional opening up and safeguard the multilateral trading system. Promote innovative development of trade and promote balanced and coordinated imports and exports. Create a transparent, stable, and predictable institutional environment and build the "Invest in China" brand. Jointly build the Belt and Road with high quality, coordinate the advancement of major landmark projects and "small but beautiful" livelihood projects, support domestic enterprises to deeply participate in international market competition, forge stronger resilience in participating in international competition, and win greater initiative in expanding opening up.
Fifth, adhere to shared development and achieve decisive progress in common prosperity for all the people. Chinese-style modernization is not the modernization of a few people, but the modernization of all the people. During the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, we should promote the comprehensive development of people and common prosperity for all the people. Lead Chinese-style modernization with the concept of sharing, and ensure and improve people's livelihood in high-quality development. The entire process of implementing the shared development philosophy is a practical process of continuously enhancing the people's sense of gain, happiness, and security. Adhere to putting the people first, combine investment in things with investment in people, continuously fill shortcomings in people's livelihood and promote social fairness and justice. Cover multiple livelihood fields such as education, employment, social security, people's health, and basic public services, and continuously improve the quality of people's lives.
Effectively transform the new development philosophy into governance effectiveness
The key to the new development philosophy leading Chinese-style modernization to achieve decisive progress lies in transforming the advantage of philosophy into governance effectiveness.
Adhere to the systems concept and emphasize overall advancement. Economic work is specific and interconnected. To fully, accurately, and comprehensively implement the new development philosophy, we must adhere to the systems concept, both preventing "single-soldier advance" from destroying system balance and avoiding "evenly distributed effort" from delaying development opportunities. Coordinate improving quality and expanding total volume, and achieve an overall leap in development quality and development level in the coordinated advancement of consolidating and expanding advantages, breaking through bottleneck constraints, and strengthening weak links and shortcomings.
Adhere to problem orientation and solve development problems. On the new journey of Chinese-style modernization, we still face some development problems that urgently need to be solved, such as intertwined cyclical, structural, and institutional problems, prominent contradictions of strong supply and weak demand, problems of blockages and bottlenecks in the domestic great circulation, problems of transformation of old and new driving forces, and preventing and resolving risks of real estate, local government debt, and small and medium-sized financial institutions. We must take practical problems as the focus, work hard on filling shortcomings and strengthening weak links, and enhance the precision and effectiveness of development.
Adhere to 实事求是 (shí shì qiú shì - "seek truth from facts") and ensure the philosophy takes root. The new development philosophy leading Chinese-style modernization must maintain strategic focus, proceed from reality, and pursue solid, water-free, effective, quality, and sustainable economic development. Strengthen confidence, make good use of advantages, better coordinate domestic economic work and international economic and trade struggle, and better coordinate development and security. Establish and practice a correct view of political achievements, implement with full fidelity, with the force of thunder and the speed of wind (雷厉风行, léi lì fēng xíng - "with the force of thunder and the speed of wind," vigorously and promptly), daring to act and doing well, seeking truth and being pragmatic (求真务实, qiú zhēn wù shí - "seek truth and be pragmatic"), and ensure that decisive progress is made in basically realizing socialist modernization.
Return to TopBy: 宋阳
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the Party Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core has attached great importance to ideological and political education, emphasizing the continuous strengthening and improvement of ideological and political education in schools in the new era, and comprehensively building an ideological and political education system that consolidates the foundation and casts the soul. The promotion meeting on advancing the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities in the new era, held in February 2026, further proposed that "on the new journey of the new era, the school education environment and student characteristics have undergone significant changes, and there is an urgent need to strengthen and improve the construction of ideological and political courses, and persistently use Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era to cast the soul and cultivate people." This has pointed out the direction for the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities, and has also put forward higher practical requirements for promoting the reform and innovation of ideological and political courses. To implement this practical requirement, we must continue to make sustained efforts around three key directions.
Building a comprehensive ideological and political course system in colleges and universities with complete content. On the new journey of the new era, an important goal of the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities is to build a course and textbook system with Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era as the core content, which both reflects the latest achievements of the Party's innovative theory and follows the inherent laws of ideological and political education, consolidating the course carrier support for ideological and political courses to foster virtue through education.
Adhering to the synchronous advancement of ideological and political course construction and the arming of the Party's innovative theory. As the Marxism of contemporary China, Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era is the fundamental guideline for ideological and political courses to cast the soul and cultivate people. The latest theoretical achievements of this thought must be promptly integrated into various ideological and political courses. Improve the dynamic update mechanism, enrich teaching content around major propositions such as Chinese-style modernization, new quality productive forces, and whole-process people's democracy, ensuring that ideological and political courses always resonate at the same frequency as the Party's theoretical innovation. Strengthen theoretical interpretation, pay attention to explaining thoroughly, deeply, and vividly the core essence of the Party's innovative theory from an academic perspective, avoid simplification and labeling, effectively transform theoretical achievements into teaching effectiveness, and make ideological and political courses the main battlefield for disseminating truth and cultivating values.
Consolidating the foundation of the "Three Cultures" and optimizing the content supply of ideological and political courses. Excellent traditional Chinese culture, revolutionary culture, and advanced socialist culture are the profound strength foundation for enriching the teaching content of ideological and political courses and enhancing theoretical appeal and persuasiveness. To strengthen the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities, it is necessary to deeply explore and absorb the valuable resources contained in excellent traditional Chinese culture, and organically integrate them with the education of socialist core values; inherit and carry forward revolutionary culture, make good use of the spiritual pedigree of Chinese Communists, and be good at integrating the heroic deeds and revolutionary spirit of China's revolutionary period into ideological and political course teaching; take the remarkable achievements of socialism with Chinese characteristics as content support, focus on the great achievements made in the process of Chinese-style modernization, and use vivid cases to tell China's stories well and spread China's voice well. Through the organic embedding of the "Three Cultures," break down the barriers between textbooks and life, theory and reality, and enhance the attractiveness and appeal of ideological and political course content.
Perfecting the integrated architecture and building a layered and classified complete course system. The ideological and political course system in colleges and universities should adhere to the unity of vertical connection and horizontal coordination. At the vertical level, connect the course design of different academic stages of bachelor's, master's, and doctoral programs, achieving progressive advancement of content by levels and spiral upward, avoiding simple repetition or disconnection and gaps. At the horizontal level, do a good job of organic connection between required courses and elective courses, forming a complete pattern with main courses as support and characteristic courses as supplements. Promote the deep integration of the course system with the second classroom, practical courses, and online education, forming an education closed loop with coordinated efforts inside and outside the classroom, online and offline, and on and off campus.
Achieving deep breakthroughs in educational effectiveness through upholding integrity and innovation. The so-called "upholding integrity" means consistently adhering to the guiding position of Marxist theory and the original aspiration of fostering virtue through education; the so-called "innovation" means keeping pace with the times, stimulating classroom vitality through content optimization and method innovation, and creating a good teaching ecology for ideological and political courses in colleges and universities. The two are 相辅相成 (xiāng fǔ xiāng chéng - "mutually assist and mutually complete," complementary to each other), jointly promoting the leap of ideological and political courses from "having" to "excellent," and achieving deep breakthroughs in educational effectiveness.
Adhering to the "Two Combinations" and realizing the organic unity of theoretical persuasiveness and value guidance. The "Two Combinations" is the core starting point for upholding integrity and innovation in ideological and political courses. It is necessary to combine the basic principles of Marxism with China's specific realities, use the vivid practice of governance in the new era to confirm the truthfulness of theory, transform abstract principles into perceptible Chinese stories, enable students to comprehend the profound logic of "Marxism works" from "China's governance," and enhance theoretical persuasiveness with development facts. Promote the combination of the basic principles of Marxism with excellent traditional Chinese culture, deeply explore the contemporary value of traditional wisdom such as "the people are the foundation of the state" and "governing with virtue," integrate them into ideological and political courses, and endow Marxism with a distinct national style and Chinese character. This combination can awaken students' cultural genes and build a spiritual bond of value identification in the connection between ancient and modern times. When the thoroughness of theory is presented through vivid history and reality, when value guidance is deeply rooted in the fertile soil of national culture, ideological and political courses are no longer abstract preaching, but become a spiritual baptism for young students to strengthen their beliefs and cultivate their moral character.
Adhering to innovation-driven development and promoting the transformation of ideological and political courses from knowledge transmission to value identification and ability forging. Adhering to innovation-driven development is the driving force source for promoting the connotative development of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities. Compared with the traditional teaching method of ideological and political courses that emphasizes knowledge point output, the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities in the new era pays more attention to promoting the Party's innovative theory to enter the mind and heart, truly realizing internalization in the mind and externalization in action. The construction of ideological and political courses needs systematic innovation from three dimensions: teaching methods, teaching means, and teaching evaluation. In teaching methods, actively promote interactive teaching models such as case teaching and scenario simulation, guide students to distinguish right from wrong and firm their positions in theoretical learning, and stimulate students' endogenous motivation for active learning. In teaching means, fully utilize digital-intelligent technology tools such as virtual reality and smart classrooms, create immersive teaching scenarios, and enhance the attractiveness and appeal of ideological and political courses. In the evaluation mechanism, introduce process-oriented evaluation and diversified assessment, pay attention to examining students' mastery of knowledge points, and pay attention to the improvement of their comprehensive abilities such as value judgment and teamwork. Through a series of innovations, promote the organic unity of knowledge transmission, value identification, and ability forging in ideological and political course teaching in colleges and universities.
Building a high-standard professional team of ideological and political course teachers. Teachers are the key force in running ideological and political courses well in colleges and universities, and the construction of the teaching team is the core support for promoting the high-quality development of ideological and political courses. To strengthen the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities in the new era, it is necessary to place the construction of the teaching team in a prominent position, and build a teaching team that is "politically strong, with deep feelings, new thinking, broad vision, strict self-discipline, and upright personality," providing solid talent support for the construction of ideological and political courses in colleges and universities in the new era.
Strictly guarding the "political pass" and the "teacher ethics pass" and building a solid foundation of teachers' beliefs. The fundamental quality of ideological and political course teachers lies in political firmness and noble teacher ethics. Strictly guarding the "political pass" means adhering to the principle that educators must first be educated, and taking political standards as the primary yardstick for teacher recruitment, assessment, and promotion. Through the normalization of political theory rotation training and Party conditions and national conditions research and study, guide teachers to deeply understand the decisive significance of the "Two Establishments," enhance the "Four Consciousnesses," strengthen the "Four Confidences," and achieve the "Two Upholds," ensuring that classroom teaching has discipline and academic research has direction. Strictly guard the "teacher ethics pass," build a systematic teacher ethics construction system, and implement the negative list of teacher ethics assessment and the "one-vote veto" system. Promote the teacher ethics cultivation project. Ideological and political course teachers should infect students with personality charm, inspire students with firm beliefs, and transmit truth, goodness, and beauty through 言传身教 (yán chuán shēn jiào - "teach by words and demonstrate by example," to instruct by both precept and example). Only when teachers themselves become firm believers and exemplary practitioners of Marxism can they 理直气壮 (lǐ zhí qì zhuàng - "reason upright, spirit strong," to speak with confidence because one is in the right) teach ideological and political courses and truly become guides for students' thinking.
Enhancing "teaching ability" and "research ability" and strengthening teachers' professional quality. Professional quality is the foundation for ideological and political course teachers in colleges and universities to 安身立命 (ān shēn lì mìng - "settle the body and establish destiny," one's foundation for living and standing). Enhance "teaching ability," build a layered and classified teacher training system, rely on platforms such as master teacher studios, teaching competitions, and cross-school collective lesson preparation, temper teachers' teaching design ability, classroom organization ability, and language expression art, enabling them to transform "big principles" into "small stories" and "written language" into "everyday language." Enhance "research ability," encourage teachers to deeply study Marxist theory classics, pay attention to frontier topics in the practice of socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era, produce research results with theoretical depth and contemporary temperature, and promote research feeding back into teaching. Through the two-way drive of teaching and research, forge a team of professional ideological and political course teachers with deep theoretical foundations, high teaching levels, and strong education capabilities.
(The author is a special researcher at the Shaanxi Provincial Research Center for the Theoretical System of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics (陕西省中国特色社会主义理论体系研究中心) and Dean of the School of Marxism at Xi'an University of Architecture and Technology (西安建筑科技大学).)
Return to TopBy: 蓝汉林
General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that "daring and being good at struggle, and always maintaining firm confidence in victory" is one of the outstanding qualities of our Party that is incomparable to any other. Looking back over the 105-year course of struggle, our Party was born amid domestic turmoil and foreign aggression, grew amid hardship and setbacks, and strengthened itself by surmounting difficulties — the spirit of struggle runs through the entire course. Daring and being good at struggle is the spiritual code by which the Party, after a century of storms, remains in its prime, and it is a powerful ideological weapon for overcoming risks and challenges on the new journey. A deep understanding of this quality is of major and far-reaching theoretical and practical significance for strengthening strategic confidence and enhancing the ability to struggle.
Daring to struggle addresses the question of "whether one dares," and embodies the distinct political character innate to the Communist Party of China. During the era of revolutionary warfare, countless Communists met death with the calm and generosity of "beheading is of no concern, so long as the truth prevails," and shed their blood on the battlefield with the heroic spirit of "for the sake of sacrifice and lofty ambition, daring to make the sun and moon shine in a new sky." After the founding of New China, faced with a poor and blank foundation and imperialist blockade, the Party led the people in establishing an independent and relatively complete industrial system and national economic system; the "two bombs, one satellite" burst onto the scene, rewriting the face of old China. In the new period of reform and opening up, Deng Xiaoping issued the resounding call that "without a bit of daring to break through, without a bit of daring to 'venture,' one cannot blaze a good path." From implementing the household contract responsibility system to establishing special economic zones, to establishing the socialist market economy system, the Party, with the sharpness of daring to break through and dare to experiment, enabled China to catch up with the times in big strides. At present, the once-in-a-century transformation of the world is accelerating, and China's development has entered a period in which strategic opportunities and risks and challenges coexist, and uncertainties and unpredictable factors increase. Reform and development have entered the deep-water zone; the "bottleneck" problem of key core technologies urgently needs to be solved; ideological struggle is acute and complex. Daring to struggle means strengthening awareness of potential dangers and bottom-line thinking, always being prepared to withstand major tests of high winds and rough waves, even violent storms, making no concession on matters of principle, and resolutely safeguarding national sovereignty, security, and development interests.
Being good at struggle addresses the question of "whether one is capable," and manifests the practical wisdom of Chinese Communists in sizing up the situation and steering the course. Struggle is both a science, with inherent laws to follow, and an art, requiring superb strategy and methods. The core of the art of struggle lies in adhering to seeking truth from facts. This is the living soul of Marxism. During the period of Wang Ming's "Left" error, mechanically copying the Soviet experience caused severe losses to the revolutionary forces; after the Zunyi Meeting established the principle of seeking truth from facts, the revolutionary situation took on an entirely new look. The key to the art of struggle lies in grasping the principal contradiction. Society advances amid the movement of contradictions; grasping the principal contradiction enables one to seize the "ox by the nose." During the War of Resistance Against Japan, the national contradiction rose to become the principal contradiction; the Party established the anti-Japanese national united front and created the struggle strategy of "just, advantageous, and restrained." In the early period of reform and opening up, the Party resolutely shifted the focus of work to economic construction, opening up a new situation in socialism with Chinese characteristics. In the new era, the principal contradiction in society has undergone transformation; we must deeply perceive this change, adhere to coordinating development and security, grasp the principal contradiction amid complex situations, resolve risks and break through bottlenecks with scientific strategy, and ensure that the great ship of the Chinese nation cleaves through waves and sails steadily and far. Struggle must also adhere to the unity of principle and flexibility. During the Chongqing negotiations, Mao Zedong, regardless of personal safety, personally went to Chongqing, demonstrating both a firm stance in defending the people's interests and making necessary concessions and compromises, manifesting superb art of struggle. The proposal of the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence after the founding of New China, and the great creation of "one country, two systems" during reform and opening up — all embody the high degree of unity between principle and flexibility.
Daring to struggle and being good at struggle complement each other, promote each other, and are unified in the great practice of the Party leading the people in surmounting difficulties; they reveal the distinctive quality that distinguishes our Party from other political parties, and resolve the question of "advancing from victory to victory." Daring to struggle is the premise of being good at struggle; without the spirit of struggle, no strategy, however good, can be put into play. Being good at struggle is the support for daring to struggle; lacking the ability to struggle, no will, however strong, can be sustained. Throughout the 105-year course of struggle of the Communist Party of China, daring to struggle and being good at struggle have always been fused as one. During the Long March, the Red Army had to fight bloody battles against enemies dozens of times its own size, and also had to be flexible and mobile, avoiding the enemy's strength and striking at its weakness; the four crossings of the Chishui River demonstrated superb struggle wisdom. On the battlefield of the War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea, the Chinese People's Volunteers, with "more spirit and less steel," overcame the enemy's "more steel and less spirit" — daring to fight and determined to win, while also promoting negotiation through fighting, winning prestige for the nation and the military. In the "two bombs, one satellite" endeavor, success relied both on the aspiration of self-reliance and hard struggle, and on the wisdom of respecting laws and coordinating efforts in tackling key problems. The fusion of daring to struggle and being good at struggle has created miracle after miracle recorded in the annals of history.
History and reality tell us that one-sidedly emphasizing the courage to struggle while neglecting struggle strategy leads to the error of adventurism; one-sidedly emphasizing strategic methods while lacking the courage to struggle leads toward opportunism and even capitulation. Only by adhering to the dialectical unity of daring to struggle and being good at struggle can we always maintain strategic initiative in the face of various risks and challenges. At present, we are closer than at any time in history to the goal of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. We must integrate the spirit of struggle into our very being, strengthen the resolve to keep the path unchanged and the direction unaltered, and, with the determination to overcome all difficulties, rely on tenacious struggle to open up new horizons for the development of our cause.
Return to TopBy: 郑诚
The origins of the Cambridge University Library can be traced back to 1416. Since 1710, it has legally received legal deposit copies, and it is now one of the six national legal deposit libraries in the United Kingdom, with a total collection exceeding 9 million volumes. The Chinese Department within the library holds approximately 300,000 physical books and periodicals, including more than 2,000 core treasures, most of which are Chinese ancient books printed or written before 1912. Most of this batch of ancient books were successively acquired between 1632 and the second half of the 20th century; this 300-year lineage of acquisition also outlines the history of exchanges and communications between China and the United Kingdom from a material perspective.
Early sporadic acquisitions of Ming and Qing dynasty woodblock prints
As of 1885, the Chinese ancient books collected by the Cambridge University Library numbered no more than 10 volumes, most of which were Ming and Qing dynasty woodblock prints brought to Europe in the 17th century. In 1605, Dutch merchants in Amsterdam sold large quantities of commodities brought back from the Chinese coast, which caused a sensation; these included many Chinese books, primarily daily-use books such as examination materials, miscellaneous characters, medical books, and novels printed by Fujian publishing houses. For 17th-century Europeans, Chinese ancient books were more like exotic overseas curios. At that time, what British collectors obtained were mostly individual volumes sold separately, which were subsequently converted into Western-style bindings; most were preserved in the British Library, Oxford University, and Cambridge University, and some fragmentary copies could be used to supplement one another.
In 1632, the Cambridge University Library obtained its first Chinese ancient book—a fragmentary Ming printing of Danxi Xinfa Fuyu (丹溪心法附余). This book was originally part of the former collection of the Dutch Orientalist Opdenaken. In 1625, the Honorary Chancellor of Cambridge University, the Duke of Buckingham, Villiers, acquired Opdenaken's Orientalist library. After Villiers passed away, his widow donated part of the collection, including Opdenaken's former holdings, to the Cambridge University Library. In the mid-to-late 17th century, another three Ming woodblock prints were acquired by the library.
In 1715, King George I of the United Kingdom purchased 30,000 volumes from the library of John Moore, Bishop of Ely, and donated them in their entirety to Cambridge University. The library, which originally had a deficient collection, thus saw a sudden increase in scale. The donated books included two Ming woodblock prints, namely the Chongzhen 6th year preface-printed edition of Xi Han Wen (西汉文) and the Wanli 32nd year Han Hai Shu Lin printed edition of Xin Ke Zeng Bu Xi Dui Jin Qu Da Quan Man Tian Chun (新刻增补戏队锦曲大全满天春). During the following 170-plus years, only sporadic Chinese documents entered the library. For example, a vermilion edict (also known as a "red slip") donated in 1815 by Edward Clark, a professor of mineralogy and librarian at Cambridge University, was a Manchu, Han, and Latin trilingual public letter printed and sent to Europe in the 55th year of Kangxi (1716).
From the collection of Wragge to a mature Sinological research collection system
In 1886, the Cambridge University Library obtained its first large batch of Chinese books—883 volumes of Chinese ancient books donated by the former British Minister to Beijing, Wragge, of which 4,304 items were in hardcover. In 1888, Wragge was elected as the first Professor of Sinology at Cambridge University, while simultaneously being responsible for managing the university's newly established Chinese reading room.
Wragge's collection was originally reference material accumulated during his 40 years as a professional diplomat in China, consisting of four categories of works, with an emphasis on genres such as political affairs and history. Although it lacked Song and Yuan dynasty woodblock prints, it was not lacking in rare documents, including at least 35 Ming woodblock prints and 40 manuscripts, as well as dozens of Manchu and Mongolian documents. Rare items included the Ming printing of Yiyu Tuzhi (异域图志), late Ming manuscripts such as An Qian Shu Cao (按黔疏草) and Fu Shuo Shu Cao (抚朔疏草), the manuscript Ming Shilu (明实录), and the Manchu manuscript Yangzheng Tujie (养正图解). The fine and excellent copies mostly came from the Beijing book market during the Tongzhi and Guangxu reigns. From the collection marks, it can be known that the former owners of these books included: Bai Ling, Chen Kai, Xu Naijin, Huang Tingjian, Jiang Guoxiang, Jiang Tingxi, Kui Xu, Liang Qingyuan, Liu Xihai, Mei Yizheng, Pan Shijian, Peng Yuanrui, Qu Xitang, Shen Yunxiang, Sun Chengze, Wang Tao, Yang Wensun, Zhang Ruixi, and others. Documents related to the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom were also a major feature of Wragge's collection, totaling 40 items, primarily woodblock prints, including various unique copies such as Taiping Tianri (太平天日).
Between 1887 and 1915, the Cambridge University Library successively acquired more than 110 types of Chinese ancient books, totaling approximately 1,300 volumes, most of which were Beijing books sold by Baskerville in the United Kingdom in 1908, such as the Jiajing 6th year Fan Chuan Bie Ye edition of Liezi (列子) and the Jiajing 15th year Yu Ji Shan Ren printed edition of Ji Qian Jia Zhu Du Gongbu Shi Ji Ji (集千家注杜工部诗集) and Wen Ji (文集). In 1898 and 1915, the Catalogue of Chinese and Manchu Books in the Wragge Collection of the Cambridge University Library (剑桥大学图书馆藏威妥玛文库汉文满文图书目录) and its Supplement to the Catalogue (目录补编) were published respectively, authored by James Legge, the second Professor of Sinology at Cambridge University. In 1901 and 1926, one volume of the Yongle Dadian (永乐大典) Jiajing manuscript was acquired in each year. The former consists of two volumes and is the only extant copy of the "Suan" (算) section of the Yongle Dadian, preserving a vast amount of ancient Chinese mathematical literature, making it exceptionally precious. In 1939, the third Professor of Sinology, Maude, donated the collection of his father, Maude, the Anglican Bishop of Hangzhou, which included an exquisite Chongzhen 6th year color woodblock print of Shi Zhu Zhai Shu Hua Pu (十竹斋书画谱), as well as protection certificates issued to Maude by Taiping Heavenly Kingdom generals.
In 1946, the Cambridge University Library again obtained a large number of Chinese books. The primary acquisition was 1,120 volumes of the Daozang (道藏) printed by the Commercial Press in the 1920s, donated by the Chengdu Shishi Middle School in exchange for English books. Secondly, there were 693 volumes of 10 types of Qing dynasty woodblock prints, such as Yuhan Shanfang Jiyi Shu (玉函山房辑佚书) and Hanxuetang Congshu (汉学堂丛书), donated by the National Central Library. The Sichuan Museum donated items such as posthumous treasures and jade belt rubbings unearthed from the Tomb of Wang Jian, and Han dynasty stone portrait rubbings. Additionally, with the help of Joseph Needham, the Cambridge University Library also purchased 15 types of Qing dynasty woodblock prints, such as Er You Tang Cong Shu (二酉堂丛书) and Han Wei Liu Chao Bai San Jia Ji Ji (汉魏六朝百三家集).
After the end of the Second World War, the procurement of Chinese materials by the Cambridge University Library began to receive financial guarantees, and the scale of the collection expanded rapidly. In 1948, the library acquired 4,223 volumes and 908 periodicals from the former administrator of Weihaiwei, Luo Rinting. In 1949, the fourth Professor of Sinology, Scholes, utilized special book procurement funds to travel to China (mainly Hong Kong, Macau, and Guangzhou) and Japan, purchasing nearly 10,000 volumes, including the manuscript Zheng Tang Du Ji Shu (郑堂读书记) from the former collection of Ding Richang and Liu Chenggan. In 1952, approximately 800 Yin Ruins oracle bones from the former collection of Jin Zhang, the former British Consul General in Tianjin, were acquired by the library. In the 34th year of Guangxu (1908), the Qing government donated a set of 5,000 volumes of the Tongwen Shuyuan lithographed edition of Gujin Tushu Jicheng (古今图书集成) to the China Society in London, which the Society later transferred to the Cambridge University Library.
During the 1950s to 1970s, during the more than 20 years that the Dutch Sinologist Long, Peter served as the Honorary Director of the Chinese Department of the Cambridge University Library, he carefully selected Chinese publications and added microfilms such as the "Fine Books from the Jia Ku of the Beiping Library" (北平图书馆甲库善本) and "Dunhuang Documents in the Beijing Library" (北京图书馆藏敦煌文献). During Peter Long's tenure, the variety and number of Chinese books in the collection grew to five times the previous amount. By the late 1970s, a high-quality research-oriented collection system had been formed, with a particular emphasis on Chinese traditional culture, history, literature, and art materials. A specialized Chinese book classification system was also jointly formulated by Scholes and Peter Long. Since 1980, the categories and quantity of the Chinese Department's collection have expanded significantly, with occasional acquisitions of individual ancient books.
Currently, high-definition images of some rare Chinese documents in the collection can be browsed on the Cambridge University Digital Library website. In March 2016, the Cambridge University Library held a special exhibition for its 600th anniversary. The Chinese Department selected Shang dynasty inscribed oracle bones and the Northern Song dynasty Chongning edition of Foshuo Dacheng Guanshang Manluo Jing Zhu E Qu Ji (佛说大乘观想曼拏罗净诸恶趣经) for the exhibition; these two represent the library's oldest Chinese document and its oldest Chinese printed book, respectively.
College libraries and the East Asian collections of the Needham Institute
At least 12 college libraries at Cambridge University contain Chinese ancient books. Of the 42 currently known, most were donated by the faculty and students of the respective colleges during the 17th to 19th centuries. Among them are 25 Ming woodblock prints, most of which are fragmentary workshop prints, similar in nature to the library's early acquisitions. Some varieties originated from Amsterdam auctions in the early 17th century, such as the Gushi Junchen Daquan (故事君臣大全) and Gushi Jinbi Daquan (故事金璧大全) held by Trinity College, which are fragmentary rolls of late Ming Fujian prints, donated by Adam Bowen, a clerk at the London headquarters of the East India Company, in 1628; the fragmentary Ming printing of Danxi Xinfa Fuyu held by Christ's College should be from the same edition as the one acquired by the library in 1632; there are also fragmentary Ming dynasty editions of the Analects (论语), donated by a college graduate in 1685; Clare College, Emmanuel College, and Magdalene College each hold one copy of the Datong Li (大统历) from the 25th year of the Yongli reign of the Southern Ming, which came from 50 calendars donated to the East India Company merchants by Zheng Jing in 1670. Additionally, the six types of Qing woodblock prints, including the Xian Di Pi Pa Pu (弦笛琵琶谱), and a manuscript of an English-Chinese vocabulary comparison table held by St John's College, were donated in 1804 by the mathematician James Ingram; the fragmentary Wan Shou Tang Ren Jue Ju (万首唐人绝句) held by Gonville and Caius College may be a 孑遗 (jié yí - "leftover remnant," a solitary surviving relic) of the Siku Quanshu from the Wenzong Pavilion in Zhenjiang.
It is worth mentioning the Needham Institute, located 500 meters west of the main building of the Cambridge University Library. The institute was founded in 1986 by the famous British historian of science and technology, Joseph Needham, with the aim of promoting research into the history of East Asian science and technology and facilitating cultural exchanges between the East and the West. Although the Needham Institute is an independent institution, its East Asian History of Science Library shares resources with the Cambridge University Library system and also works closely with the Chinese Department to collect Chinese documents through a division of labor. Furthermore, nearly 700 Chinese thread-bound books from Joseph Needham's former collection, the vast majority of which are Qing dynasty and Republican era prints, served as the cornerstone for the compilation of the English-language Science and Civilisation in China series (originally titled Science and Civilisation in China) 70 years ago.
Looking across the more than 300 years of accumulation of the Chinese collection of the Cambridge University Library, these precious classics are not only vivid evidence of cultural exchanges between China and the West, carrying the marks of academic interconnection, but also allow Chinese culture to cross mountains and seas to radiate new life.
(The author is a researcher at the Institute of History of Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences)
Return to TopBy: 袁冰
The Shiliao Bencao (Dietary Materia Medica) was written by the renowned Tang dynasty physician and pharmacologist Meng Shen (621–713 CE), and was later supplemented and revised by his disciple Zhang Ding. It was completed around the Kaiyuan reign period of the Tang dynasty (713–741 CE). Meng Shen was a disciple of Sun Simiao, the "King of Medicine," and from an early age was devoted to medicine and pharmacology, specializing in the study of dietary therapy and the arts of health preservation. The original text recorded 138 medicinal foodstuffs; Zhang Ding added 89 more, for a total of 227, arranged in three volumes. The work takes as its primary medicinal sources the rice and grains, vegetables, fruits and melons, and animals consumed in daily life, and expounds their pharmacological actions, methods of consumption, therapeutic effects, and contraindications. As the earliest extant specialized work on dietary therapy in China, the Shiliao Bencao, building upon the Huangdi Neijing (Yellow Emperor's Inner Canon) and Sun Simiao's Beiji Qianjin Yaofang (Emergency Formulas Worth a Thousand in Gold), "Shizhi" (Dietary Treatment) chapter, synthesizes pre-Tang thought and practice on nourishing through food.
Equal emphasis on prevention and treatment; nourishment through food comes first
The foremost principle of the dietary-nourishment thought of the Shiliao Bencao is the "equal emphasis on prevention and treatment" that runs through the entire work. In compiling the text, Meng Shen integrated the health-preservation wisdom and clinical experience of earlier physicians, establishing dietary therapy as the core principle of nourishing life through food. He deeply recognized that the occurrence and development of disease are closely bound up with daily dietary regulation. Rather than seeking medicine after falling ill, it is better to nourish the upright qi through food before illness, so that the body's vital energy is abundant and external pathogens have no avenue of invasion.
Based on this understanding, the Shiliao Bencao emphasizes that diet is not merely the basic means of sustaining life, but also an important avenue for preventing and treating disease. Every food item recorded in the text is described in detail with respect to its nature and flavor, efficacy, and the conditions it treats, making clear that foods possess medicinal properties and that the body can be regulated through a rational diet. For example, the text records that mung beans clear heat and resolve toxins, and promote diuresis to reduce swelling, making them suitable for summer consumption; red dates tonify the middle and boost qi, nourish the blood and calm the spirit, and are appropriate for those with weak constitutions or suffering from insomnia and excessive dreaming. This concept of treating food as medicine is a vivid embodiment of the idea that medicine and food share a common origin. Meng Shen himself often said: "Those who would preserve the body and nurture their nature must always keep kind words on their lips and good medicine in their hands." Daily diet is precisely the best "good medicine."
This preventive idea of "treating illness before it arises" resonates with the view in the Huangdi Neijing that "the superior physician treats illness before it manifests." Sun Simiao likewise proposed in the "Shizhi" chapter of the Beiji Qianjin Yaofang: "A physician must first thoroughly understand the source of the disease, know what has caused it, and treat it with food; only if dietary therapy fails should drugs then be prescribed." Meng Shen inherited this idea and carried it further, placing dietary regulation at the core of health preservation and disease treatment, thereby manifesting traditional Chinese medicine's distinctive wisdom of valuing the body's own regulatory functions and maintaining health through the routines of daily life.
Going too far is as bad as falling short; diet must be moderated
Another important principle of dietary-nourishment thought is the principle of moderation, that "going too far is as bad as falling short." Both the quantity and the timing of food consumption must be regulated; one should not eat too much or for too long. Any food, even if beneficial to a person, if consumed to excess or at the wrong time, can damage the viscera and bowels and induce disease. The text contains numerous specific records of this. For example, fresh ginger can dispel phlegm, direct qi downward, and stop vomiting and retching, but eating too much of it is harmful to body and mind; mutton is an excellent tonic, but pregnant women should not eat too much of it; eating too much Chinese toon can cause mental confusion. Although these views still await further confirmation today, they also show that the Shiliao Bencao does not simply list the benefits of foods, but also records in detail their contraindications and side effects, reminding people to be cautious about every meal in daily life. This dialectical attitude toward food—speaking both of its benefits and its harms—reflects the profound insight of ancient physicians into the relationship between diet and health.
The "clashing" and "harmonizing" in food combinations likewise deserve attention. Between different foods there exist mutually compatible and mutually antagonistic relationships; rational combinations can enhance tonic effects, while improper combinations may produce adverse reactions. The text takes the suitability and contraindications of food combinations as its guide, providing a systematic basis for people to choose beneficial food pairings. This idea of "holding to the mean so as to attain harmony" is of a piece with the concept of "zhonghe" (central harmony) in traditional Chinese culture, admonishing people not to be partial in their diet and not to eat to excess; only through appropriate harmonization can one preserve the viscera and bowels and prolong life.
Adapting to the three factors; differentiating patterns in dietary application
The dietary-nourishment thought of the Shiliao Bencao follows the principle of "adapting to the three factors" (person, time, and place). Meng Shen held that the selection of foods must be flexibly adjusted according to the specific condition of the body, regional differences, and temporal rhythms, and cannot be applied uniformly.
Adapting to the person means selecting appropriate foods according to differences in individual constitution, age (old or young), sex (male or female), and the nature of disease. The text discusses at length the dietary suitability and contraindications for different groups of people, embodying the personalized approach of traditional Chinese medicine in which "treatment is tailored to the individual." Adapting to the time means flexibly selecting foods according to the climatic changes of the four seasons—spring, summer, autumn, and winter. Each season has its own qi, and the viscera and bowels of the human body likewise flourish and decline with the four seasons, so dietary nourishment should follow the rhythms of nature. Adapting to the place emphasizes that different regions have different natural environments, soils, waters, and products, and that dietary habits and therapeutic methods should likewise differ accordingly. One of the distinctive features of the Shiliao Bencao is its analysis of regional differences in dietary nourishment, noting the different dietary characteristics of the south and north and their effects on human health.
This thought of differentiating dietary application according to person, time, and place is of a piece with the health-preservation program of the Huangdi Neijing: "Model on yin and yang, harmonize with the arts of calculation, be moderate in food and drink, and regular in daily living." It elevates dietary regulation to a personalized, systematic, and dynamic level, embodying the essence of traditional Chinese medicine's holistic view and pattern-based treatment.
Nourishing the viscera through food; attending to both form and spirit
Another outstanding feature of the Shiliao Bencao in its methods of dietary nourishment is "nourishing the five viscera with like substances." The text records more than sixty kinds of animal organs and viscera, as well as algae and fungal ingredients—for example, yellow hen chicken treats cold conditions; sheep stomach primarily treats deficiency and depletion of the stomach, and stops spontaneous sweating. These contents embody the traditional concepts in Chinese medicine of "treating form with form" and "nourishing the viscera with viscera." Modern research has already demonstrated that some of these views possess a certain degree of scientific validity.
The Shiliao Bencao also attaches importance to the connection between diet and the spirit and emotions. Meng Shen emphasized that "kind words should never leave the mouth," incorporating gentle speech and a tranquil state of mind into the scope of health preservation. This concept of attending to both form and spirit, and regulating body and mind together, elevates the Shiliao Bencao beyond the mere science of food nutrition into a comprehensive approach to health preservation.
As the earliest extant specialized work on dietary therapy in China, the Shiliao Bencao—with its ideas of equal emphasis on prevention and treatment, moderation (going too far being as bad as falling short), adapting to the three factors, nourishing the viscera through food, and the common origin of medicine and food—has exerted a profound influence on later generations. In contemporary society, where chronic diseases are prevalent, dietary structures are imbalanced, and sub-health conditions are widespread, revisiting the dietary-nourishment wisdom of the Shiliao Bencao and excavating the "treating before illness" concept and personalized health-preservation ideas contained within it holds important practical significance for guiding people to establish scientific and rational dietary patterns and for improving the health literacy of the entire population.
(The author is a research fellow at the Institute of Chinese Medical History and Literature, China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences.)
Return to TopBy: 王鹏程
Cheng Tang, founding monarch of the Shang dynasty, composed the "Tang Gao" (汤诰) to admonish his assembled ministers and officials: "Let none fail to render merit to the people; diligently exert your strength in your duties." The general meaning is: all matters that benefit the people's livelihood and conduce to the stability of popular welfare must be faithfully discharged, diligently practiced, and exerted to the utmost. This thousand-year ancient admonition grows ever more vital with age, becoming an important guide for later generations of worthy ministers and good officials in cultivating themselves, governing, and serving the people.
The people are the foundation of the state
The people are the foundation of the state; when the foundation is firm, the state is at peace. The common people are the root of the state's continued existence and the foundation of the altars of state's stability; all measures of governance should take benefiting and blessing the people as the core. After Shang Tang's punitive campaign against Ge, he once used flowing water as a metaphor, saying directly: "People see their reflection in water; observe the people and you know whether governance is sound." Yi Yin, upon hearing this, expressed deep agreement, regarding popular sentiment and the people's hearts as a bright mirror reflecting the gains and losses of court governance and the order or chaos of the age.
Loving the people and sympathizing with the people is the primary prerequisite of governance. The "Guanzi · Shepherding the People" (管子·牧民) states: "The rise of governance lies in following the people's hearts; the decline of governance lies in opposing the people's hearts." This shows that the direction of the people's hearts determines the rise and fall of political power and the success or failure of governance. Yanzi also said: "No virtue is higher than loving the people; no conduct is more generous than bringing joy to the people," elevating love of the people and joy of the people as the highest virtue and the most excellent conduct. Liu Xiang of the Han dynasty, in "Shuoyuan · Principles of Governance" (说苑·政理), used a profound metaphor: "One who is good at governing a state treats the people as parents love their children, as elder brothers love younger brothers: hearing of their hunger and cold, he grieves for them; seeing their toil and hardship, he sorrows for them." Fang Dashi (方大湜) of the Qing dynasty pointed out in "Pingping yan" (平平言) the integrity that officials and those in government should possess: "Toward wealth, rank, profit, and advancement, the eyes must not grow hot. Toward the people's weal and woe, the bowels must not fail to grow hot." The people's livelihood is bound to the people's hearts; the people's hearts concern the fate of the state. Those who serve as officials and engage in governance should cast aside selfish motives, keep their hearts on the common people, regard the people's affairs as family affairs, and take the people's worries as their own.
Benefiting the people and conferring benefits on the people is the core essential task of fulfilling one's duties. Wise rulers and worthy ministers of all dynasties deeply understood the principle that "water can carry a boat, and can also capsize it," always taking benefiting the people as the foundation and nourishing the people as the essential. Emperor Taizong of Tang, Li Shimin, drew the lesson of the Sui dynasty's fall to harsh governance and the loss of the people's hearts, established the principle that "the way of a ruler must first preserve the common people," lightened corvée and reduced taxes, encouraged agriculture and sericulture, 休养生息 (xiū yǎng shēng xī - "rest, nourish, live, and multiply," recuperating and rebuilding), improved the people's livelihood, and ultimately inaugurated the "Zhenguan era of governance," in which politics was clear and the people were at peace. Emperor Taizu of Ming, Zhu Yuanzhang, was born of common cloth and had personally experienced the people's hardships; deeply understanding the difficulty of the people's livelihood, he repeatedly issued edicts to reduce and exempt taxes, relieve the people's distress, and stabilize the people's hearts. During the Eastern Han, the good official Zhang Kan (张堪), serving as Grand Administrator of Yuyang (渔阳), pacified the people, encouraged land reclamation and farming, and led the populace in opening up more than eight thousand qing of paddy fields, making the commandery prosperous and stable, with the people dwelling in peace and working in contentment. The people then circulated the ballad: "The mulberry has no side branches, the wheat ears fork in two. When Lord Zhang governs, joy knows no bounds," praising his "beneficent governance of Yuyang." The famous Ming minister Yu Qian devoted his life to the state, diligent in governance and compassionate toward the people. In his "Ode to Coal," the lines "I only wish the common people all be fed and warm, not declining hardship to come forth from the mountain forest" are a true portrayal of his lifelong feelings for the people. He observed the people's hardships; whenever floods, droughts, or locust plagues occurred, he would report truthfully to the throne, reduce and exempt tax grain, and open granaries for relief; he also personally presided over the construction of water conservancy works to fundamentally remedy river disasters, planting trees along the Yellow River banks to reinforce the dikes, setting up posts for patrol and guard, and exerting every effort to protect the peace and security of the people of that region.
Diligent service day and night
Diligent service day and night; solid work prospers the state. In the "Tang Gao," Cheng Tang held up Yu the Great and Gao Yao as models for his ministers, praising the two for "long toiling abroad, rendering merit to the people, and so the people had peace." Yu the Great tamed the floods, 栉风沐雨 (zhì fēng mù yǔ - "combed by wind, bathed by rain," braving wind and rain through hardship), personally laboring; Gao Yao governed with faithful discharge of duty, diligent in governance for the people. Cheng Tang thereby admonished all officials: the way of governance values diligence and pragmatism, persistence and constancy, just as farmers tilling fields think day and night and bend to their plowing, only then can they reap harvest and benefit the people.
The Analects records that Zilu asked about the essentials of governance, and Confucius answered: "Lead by example; labor for them." Zilu earnestly requested further instruction, and Confucius added three more words: "without weariness." The so-called "lead by example" means taking the lead as a model, 以身作则 (yǐ shēn zuò zé - "use one's own person as the standard," setting an example by one's own conduct), rectifying others by one's own person and leading the multitude by virtue; "labor for them" means being diligent and pragmatic, bending to labor personally, diligent in governance and loving the people, not declining hardship; the core essence lies even more in "without weariness": always holding fast to the original aspiration, never slackening, 持之以恒 (chí zhī yǐ héng - "hold to it with constancy," persisting with perseverance). In the Qing dynasty, Qian Decang's "Jie Ren Yi · Song of Diligence and Laziness" (解人颐·勤懒歌) contains a famous line passed down through the ages: "To stand atop a hundred-foot pole is not difficult; with diligence, nothing under heaven is difficult." The intent is to make clear that however difficult the circumstances, however heavy the tasks, as long as one is diligent and not remiss, and solid work does not cease, there is no difficulty that cannot be overcome, no undertaking that cannot be accomplished.
The good officials of antiquity all took diligent governance as their duty and slackness as their great taboo. In the Ming dynasty, Yuan Hongdao governed Wu County (吴县), deeply knowing that sluggish government affairs would burden the people and that shirking and negligent governance would harm the people, so he carried out a 大刀阔斧 (dà dāo kuò fǔ - "great knife, broad axe," sweeping and resolute) rectification of official governance and reformed government affairs, strictly clarifying work standards and raising the efficiency of duty performance. All official business was handled and concluded swiftly, neither delayed nor suppressed; subordinates could often complete their tasks in the time of one meal, and contemporaries praised it as "a measure of rice's worth of official business." When Zheng Banqiao of the Qing dynasty served as magistrate of Wei County (潍县), the region happened to suffer successive years of drought and flood, with famines occurring frequently; fields lay waste, the starving dead lay across the countryside, and the people were 流离失所 (liú lí shī suǒ - "wandering adrift, losing one's place," displaced and homeless), their suffering beyond words. At the critical moment of the disaster, subordinate officials followed convention and suggested reporting level by level and awaiting approval. Zheng Banqiao categorically rejected this: "What time is this? If we wait for the report to pass through many hands, not one of the people will survive. If there is blame, I will bear it!" He disregarded his personal safety, immediately opening the granaries for disaster relief, using work as relief, recruiting the starving to undertake construction works so they could earn a living on the spot, saving the lives of countless people. The way of governance, ancient and modern, is 一脉相承 (yī mài xiāng chéng - "one vein transmitted through," a single continuous lineage): without diligence, government affairs fall into disuse; when government affairs fall into disuse, the people's livelihood withers; when the people's livelihood withers, popular resentment grows; when popular resentment deepens, the foundation of the state is shaken.
Persistent effort brings success
Cherishing the state and family in one's heart, and being resolved to serve the people, is the lifelong pursuit of men of aspiration and benevolence through the ages. Zhuge Liang vowed in the "Later Memorial on Dispatching Troops" (后出师表): "Your servant will 鞠躬尽瘁 (jū gōng jìn cuì - "bend the body, exhaust one's strength," devoting oneself utterly), 死而后已 (sǐ ér hòu yǐ - "only after death does it cease," unto death). As for success or failure, advantage or disadvantage, that is beyond your servant's foresight to anticipate." He exhausted his lifelong strength and heart in toil for the state and fulfilled his duty to the people, unwavering unto death. Wen Tianxiang, trapped in desperate circumstances and holding fast to his integrity, declared his resolve with "Since ancient times, who has not died? Keep a loyal heart to shine upon the annals of history," placing the great righteousness of state and family and the welfare of the common people above his own life and death. The worthies of old accomplished things by relying on the sincerity of their original aspiration, and even more on enduring, constant perseverance. Xunzi said: "Without accumulating half-steps, one cannot reach a thousand li; without accumulating small streams, one cannot form rivers and seas." Laozi also said: "A tree that fills one's arms grows from a tiny sprout; a nine-story terrace rises from accumulated earth." Lü Kun of the Ming dynasty spoke thus in "Shenyin yu" (呻吟语) about the way of accomplishing things: "Handling affairs is like a boxing match, shaking the great and breaking the hard. One must proceed slowly and gradually; persistent effort will show results." The great enterprise of benefiting the people has no shortcuts; it values perseverance and emphasizes accumulation.
Governance values constancy; persistent effort brings success. This is the wisdom of good officials through the ages in 兴利除弊 (xīng lì chú bì - "promote benefit, eliminate harm," advancing what is beneficial and removing what is harmful) and bringing blessings to the myriad people. Li Bing, Governor of Shu Commandery in the Qin dynasty, witnessed the Min River's perennial floods wreaking havoc and the people suffering greatly; he cast aside the water-management approach of 急功近利 (jí gōng jìn lì - "eager for merit, near to profit," seeking quick success and instant gain), and with his son devoted himself to studying the hydrology, geography, and terrain patterns of the Shu region. Expending years of painstaking effort, he led the people to cut through Lidui (离堆), divide the two rivers, and build the weir and dikes, completing the 举世闻名 (jǔ shì wén míng - "known to the whole world," world-renowned) Dujiangyan water conservancy project. The Fish Mouth divides the waters, the Flying Sand Weir discharges floods, the Bottle-Neck Channel diverts water, fundamentally remedying the Min River's flooding calamity and turning the once flood-and-drought-plagued Western Sichuan Plain into fertile fields and good farmland. After Dujiangyan was completed, successive dynasties established the system of annual maintenance, innovated water-management techniques, and perfected the management and protection system, allowing the thousand-year ancient weir to benefit the people generation after generation; to this day it still irrigates ten thousand qing of good fields and brings blessings to the people of the region. Rao Gan (饶干), a worthy minister of the Southern Song, was diligent in office; during his tenure as magistrate of Changsha, he rose early each day to govern and handle official business, and in his spare time from official duties humbly pursued learning and refined his cultivation. His sincere original aspiration and diligent conduct were admired by the world. Looking across ancient and modern times, all good governance whose merit spans a thousand years and benefits the myriad people is not the work of a single morning or evening. Only by not coveting the merit of a moment, not seeking the fame of a moment, and accumulating merit 寸积铢累 (cùn jī zhū lěi - "accumulating inch by inch, grain by grain," building up bit by bit), can one accomplish the enterprise of benefiting the people and prospering the state.
Return to TopQuestion: Song Xiaowei, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of the Trade Union of Zhongyuan Institute of Technology
General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that China is a large country with an all-dimensional demand for the quantity, quality, and structure of talent. Meeting such a huge talent demand must rely mainly on cultivating talent ourselves and improving the capacity for self-reliant and controllable talent supply. May I ask, how can we comprehensively improve the quality of independent talent cultivation?
Interpretation: Li Xiaoqiang, Vice President of the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences
Talent is the most precious strategic resource for building a strong country and achieving national rejuvenation. The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China explicitly proposed to "comprehensively improve the quality of independent talent cultivation and strive to cultivate top-notch innovative talent." General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that we must strengthen our sense of urgency, pay more attention to independent talent cultivation, and accelerate the establishment of competitive advantages in talent resources. The core of taking the path of independent talent cultivation lies in enhancing the capacity for self-reliant and controllable talent supply, and its goal lies in comprehensively improving the quality of talent cultivation, ultimately building a large-scale, well-structured, and high-quality innovative talent team.
Seizing the initiative in development through independent talent cultivation
Independent talent cultivation is an inevitable choice for responding to external risks and challenges. At present, a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation is accelerating, and global talent competition is becoming increasingly fierce. Developed countries rely on their first-mover advantages to recruit top talent globally, while certain countries, for political purposes, impose talent blockades and technological decoupling on China's key technological fields. Under this dual pressure, over-reliance on external talent introduction would not only be costly but also carry enormous uncertainty risks. To solve the "bottleneck" technology problems, we must rely on our own strength, and the key lies in having a large number of high-level talents who master core technologies and possess independent innovation capabilities. These talents must be cultivated mainly through our own efforts.
Independent talent cultivation is an inherent need of Chinese-style modernization. China is a country with a large population and a major manufacturing country, currently in a critical period of comprehensively advancing the building of a strong country and the great cause of national rejuvenation through Chinese-style modernization. To build such a super-large-scale country, we need not only a grand talent team covering scientific and technological innovation, industrial upgrading, social governance, cultural development, public services, and other fields, but also hundreds of millions of high-quality workers and technical and skilled personnel. These talents must not only possess innovative thinking and international vision, but more importantly, have a deep understanding of China's national conditions, take root in China's practice, and be able to propose "Chinese solutions" to China's problems. To meet such a huge and diverse talent demand, we must build an independent, controllable, systematic, and complete talent cultivation system.
Independent talent cultivation is the strategic cornerstone of safeguarding national security. As the role of science and technology in national defense and economic security becomes increasingly prominent, core talent in key fields has become a strategic resource related to national security. If core technologies vital to the nation's lifeline depend entirely on external talent, and key positions are dominated by outsiders, the risk to national security would increase sharply. History has repeatedly proven that truly core technologies and "bottleneck" technologies cannot be bought or begged for. To achieve high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-strengthening, we must rely on our own cultivation system to forge an innovative talent team that is loyal to the motherland, has profound expertise, and dares to make breakthroughs in basic research, frontier technology, national defense security, and other key fields, fundamentally eliminating the risk of being controlled by others and consolidating the foundation of national development and security.
Supporting the positive interaction between scientific and technological innovation and talent cultivation through education
Science and technology are the primary productive forces, talent is the primary resource, and innovation is the primary driving force. Scientific and technological innovation highly depends on talent support, while talent cultivation relies mainly on education. General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "To achieve a positive interaction between independent scientific and technological innovation and independent talent cultivation, education should further play a leading and fundamental supporting role." Education not only lays the foundation for scientific and technological innovation and talent growth through knowledge transmission, ability cultivation, and scientific research training, but also, through its educational system and cultivation mechanism, organically integrates national strategic needs and frontier developments in science and technology into the entire process of talent cultivation. Therefore, education is both the source of innovation capability and the foundational project supporting the sustainable development of talent.
Independent talent cultivation places higher demands on the functioning of education. Scientific and technological innovation continuously puts forward new requirements for talent's knowledge structure, comprehensive quality, and core capabilities, but these requirements will not automatically translate into cultivation outcomes; they must be effectively absorbed, transformed, and implemented through the education system. The foundational nature of education is reflected in its shaping of talent's knowledge, ability, and value structures, serving as the foundation for cultivating well-rounded individuals; the leading nature of education requires it to prospectively study and judge future technological trends and national strategic needs, leading the changes of the times through dynamic adjustment and proactive layout, rather than passively adapting. In the integrated development strategy of education, science and technology, and talent, the role of education lies not only in "supplying talent," but more importantly in internalizing external demands into sustainable talent cultivation capabilities.
Independent talent cultivation places higher demands on the optimization of the educational structure system. Independent talent cultivation cannot be accomplished by a single school or educational stage alone, but is a systematic project that runs through basic education, higher education, vocational education, and continuing education. Basic education focuses on stimulating scientific interest and cultivating innovative awareness and thinking qualities; higher education undertakes the important tasks of basic discipline teaching, scientific research training, and interdisciplinary cultivation; vocational education supports the growth of engineering and technical talent and highly skilled talent; continuing education serves knowledge updating, skill improvement, and lifelong development. Only by achieving coherence in goals, articulation in structure, and synergy in resources across all types and levels of education can a complete chain supporting independent talent cultivation be formed.
Independent talent cultivation places higher demands on the capacity for educational integration and transformation. To achieve a positive interaction between scientific and technological innovation and talent cultivation, the key lies in efficiently transforming scientific and technological innovation resources into talent cultivation resources, and ultimately internalizing them into students' core competencies and innovative qualities. This requires the education system to break through traditional path dependence and establish efficient mechanisms for transforming scientific and technological resources into educational resources: refining key problems from scientific research into teaching cases, and transforming platforms such as large scientific installations and key laboratories into immersive teaching scenarios. It is necessary to break down disciplinary barriers and segmentation between educational stages, and build dynamically updated curriculum maps. It is necessary to establish an evaluation system oriented toward innovation contribution, recognizing students' substantive participation in major scientific research projects, and breaking the shackles of "score-only" evaluation. Only by forming a virtuous cycle in which scientific and technological innovation drives educational upgrading and educational development supports scientific and technological breakthroughs can education truly become the core engine for the synchronized resonance of independent talent cultivation and independent scientific and technological innovation.
Improving the quality of independent talent cultivation through high-quality education development
Achieving high-level independent talent cultivation requires building a full-chain innovative talent cultivation system from basic education to higher education, from basic research to application transformation. When we emphasize independent talent cultivation, we must not only ensure the self-reliance and controllability of talent supply, independently cultivating a grand talent team that supports Chinese-style modernization, but also elevate it to the height of cultivating a national innovation culture of independent exploration and courageous breakthroughs, providing inexhaustible endogenous momentum for building a new development pattern through a high-quality talent cultivation system.
Judging the quality of talent cultivation should not only use cultivation scale, educational level, and visible achievements as yardsticks, but more importantly, whether it aligns with national strategic needs, adapts to scientific and technological innovation and industrial transformation, and promotes the comprehensive development of individuals. At present, China's education system already has the foundation for large-scale talent cultivation, but from the perspective of supporting high-level scientific and technological self-reliance and self-strengthening and the essential requirements of Chinese-style modernization, there still exist problems such as insufficient adaptation between cultivation structure and strategic needs, imperfect mechanisms for the continuous cultivation of top-notch innovative talent, insufficient depth of collaborative cultivation among education, scientific research, and industry, and incomplete alignment between evaluation mechanisms and the laws of talent growth.
Enhancing the adaptability of talent cultivation to national strategic needs. In response to the problem of temporal and spatial dislocation between discipline offerings, curriculum content, and cultivation models in some universities and the frontiers of science and technology, industrial transformation, and regional development needs, it is necessary to improve the dynamic adjustment mechanism for disciplines and majors driven by national strategic needs and scientific and technological development trends. Strengthen talent demand forecasting and cultivation quality feedback in key fields, and promptly integrate national imperatives, industrial directions, and scientific and technological frontiers into discipline construction, curriculum systems, and cultivation plans. It is necessary to coordinate enrollment plans, resource allocation, curriculum reform, and practical platform construction, promoting the transformation of talent cultivation from supply-oriented to demand-driven.
Improving the mechanism for the continuous cultivation of top-notch innovative talent. To solve the problem of poor articulation between basic education and higher education, between course learning and scientific research training, and between unified cultivation and individualized development, we must respect the laws of talent growth. Build a continuous cultivation system from interest stimulation to aspiration shaping, from knowledge learning to scientific research practice. At the basic education stage, strengthen science education, inquiry-based learning, and practical activities, protecting students' curiosity, imagination, and desire for inquiry; at the higher education stage, further consolidate basic discipline training, promote research-based teaching, improve the integrated cultivation of bachelor's, master's, and doctoral programs, and provide continuous development channels for students with potential. In particular, we should avoid simply equating the cultivation of top-notch innovative talent with competition selection and early screening, but rather focus on enabling them to stand out through long-term cultivation, sustained support, and practical tempering.
Deepening collaborative cultivation among education, scientific research, and industry. The cultivation of innovative talent, engineering and technical talent, and highly skilled talent requires tempering in real problems and scenarios. In response to the problems of cognitive misalignment and action misalignment in some schools regarding the relationship between talent cultivation and serving society, as well as industry-education integration and science-education integration remaining mere formalities, it is necessary to promote schools, research institutions, and enterprises from loose cooperation to deep collaboration. Around major scientific research tasks, major engineering projects, and frontier industrial issues, jointly formulate cultivation plans, build curriculum platforms, guide student practice, and evaluate cultivation quality. Through stable project cooperation, platform co-construction, and joint mentorship mechanisms, transform scientific research projects, engineering tasks, and industrial scenarios into course cases, experimental content, and practical projects, enabling students to grow their abilities in solving complex problems.
Improving evaluation mechanisms that conform to the laws of talent growth. Evaluation is the baton of talent cultivation. In response to the tendencies in current evaluation that emphasize visible indicators over long-term contributions, short-term output over growth potential, and single standards over differentiated development, it is necessary to further deepen evaluation reform. Establish a diversified evaluation system that values innovation capability, quality, practical effectiveness, contribution, and differentiated development. Student evaluation should pay more attention to innovative potential, practical ability, and complex problem-solving ability; teacher evaluation should place more emphasis on educational investment and effectiveness, teaching reform, and the extent to which scientific research feeds back into teaching; talent evaluation should strengthen classified evaluation and long-cycle evaluation, opening up diversified development tracks for basic research talent, engineering and technical talent, and highly skilled talent, and broadening channels for growth and success.
Emphasizing the "independence" in independent talent cultivation means continuously enhancing our own cultivation capacity in the midst of open cooperation. Looking to the future, it is necessary to continue deepening comprehensive educational reform, promoting the integrated development of education, science and technology, and talent, continuously enhancing the strategic adaptability, cross-stage coherence, resource integration, and collaborative openness of talent cultivation, and effectively transforming educational advantages into talent advantages and innovation advantages through the construction of a high-quality education system. Only by firmly rooting the foundation of talent in the fertile soil of independent cultivation can we provide more solid and more lasting support for realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation and firmly grasp the development initiative of Chinese-style modernization.
By: 王天琦
General Secretary Xi Jinping has pointed out: "The Party and the government taking the lead in living on a tight budget is for the purpose of enabling the people to live better lives; this is determined by the nature and purpose of our Party." When Party and government organs live on a tight budget, the essence is to allocate more of the limited fiscal resources to the long-term interests that the people care about most, feel most directly, and find most real, using the "subtraction" of government expenditure in exchange for the "addition" of people's livelihood welfare. Public finance is the foundation and important pillar of state governance, and fiscal departments bear the important responsibility of serving the Party committee and government in "managing the household and handling finances." In adhering to living on a tight budget, it is necessary to be meticulous in calculating "small sums" and, even more so, to avoid being free-spending with "large sums"; what should not be spent must resolutely not be spent, and a rigorous system must delineate the "red line" for the use of fiscal funds. Implementing the requirement of living on a tight budget is not only about "spending less and spending nothing," but even more about "spending well and doing things well," and in practicing a correct view of political achievements, answering the practical questions of "where the money is saved from, how the saved money is used, and how to ensure that spending yields benefits."
Practice strict economy and, with the sense of responsibility to "dare to say no," curb extravagance and waste. The key to financial management is to economize and enrich the people. It is necessary to always take the correct view of political achievements as the value guide, effectively enhance sensitivity to and care for the people's livelihood, resolutely reduce redundant ostentation, excessive-standard receptions, and blind investment, and plug the loopholes of fund waste at the source. Ensure that fiscal funds are used on the blade's edge and in critical places. Resolutely say no to the trend of extravagance and waste. Hard struggle and diligence and thrift are the political本色 and fine traditions of our Party, and are also the basic principles that budget revenue and expenditure arrangements must follow. At present, official expenditures of Party and government organs are comprehensively regulated, and the good atmosphere of diligence and thrift is continuously consolidated, but phenomena such as ostentatious celebrations and forums and above-standard official activities still exist in a small number of localities and departments. Adhere to running all undertakings with diligence and thrift, introduce a "dual-control" mechanism for official overseas travel, promote the sharing of designated conference resources, further standardize travel expenses, strictly control "three public expenditures and two expenses," and reduce administrative operating costs. Implement list-based management of celebrations, forums, and exhibitions, and reduce non-essential expenditures. Strictly regulate government procurement behavior, strictly control the outsourcing of research projects, and continuously improve the efficiency of fiscal fund use. Resolutely say no to blindly launching projects. Living on a tight budget requires not only meticulous calculation in administrative expenditure, but also strict control over the threshold in investment and construction. Some localities pursue "short, flat, fast" visible political achievements, ignore local fiscal capacity, blindly launch low-efficiency and ineffective projects, and even illegally incur debt for "image projects" and "political achievement projects," burying risks and hidden dangers for long-term local development. Strengthen full-life-cycle management of government investment projects, compile a full-caliber government investment plan, promote the establishment of government investment affordability assessment mechanisms in all localities, comprehensively assess current-period investment, long-term burdens, and overall risks, and for any government investment project that fails the assessment, arrange no budget at all, resolutely refusing to give a green light to blindly expanding the scope of work and launching projects. Resolutely say no to low-efficiency and ineffective expenditure. Where fiscal funds are directed and what effects they produce is, in essence, the concretization and embodiment of the view of political achievements in resource allocation. For some time, some special funds have had overlapping support areas, weak guiding roles, and low fund use efficiency. Step out of the rigid mindset of "base dependence," take deepening zero-based budget reform as the guide, accelerate the construction of expenditure standard systems, promote the systematic integration of special funds, ensure that what should be guaranteed is fully guaranteed and what should be compressed is resolutely compressed, and from the source tighten the "water tap" and hold the "money bag" tightly. Take budget performance management as an important starting point for implementing the requirement of living on a tight budget, comprehensively advance cost-budget performance management, take evaluation results as an important basis for budget arrangements, and for projects and funds with poor performance, stop them when they should be stopped and reduce them as much as they should be reduced. Public institutions are a relatively weak and easily overlooked link in the budget management chain; formulate opinions on further improving the standardization level of financial management of provincial-level public institutions, strengthen sub-field management of public institutions such as universities and hospitals, and resolutely control the "leakage, dripping, running off, and loss" of funds.
Serve the overall situation and, with the capability to "be good at saying yes," promote development and ensure people's livelihood. Finance originates in wealth but its key lies in governance; it must exert force in key aspects to meet the needs of economic and social development. Establish the concept of "big finance," do the work of the "steward" with the mindset of the "head of household," and use the precious funds saved through "tightening" in critical areas of development and urgent needs of the people's livelihood, achieving well-managed strict expenditure control, powerful guarantees of key areas, and effective service to development. Be "good at saying yes" in implementing a more proactive fiscal policy and promoting economic recovery and improvement. Fiscal policy, as the main means of macro-control, is crucial for smoothing out cyclical economic fluctuations and promoting the effective improvement of economic quality and reasonable growth of quantity. Conscientiously implement a more proactive fiscal policy, adhere to the close integration of benefiting the people's livelihood and promoting consumption, and of investing in things and investing in people, strengthen alignment with development plans and major strategies and coordination with financial and industrial policies, and focus on improving the implementation effect of fiscal policy. In areas such as the "self-review and self-issuance" of local government special bonds and fiscal interest subsidies, effective practices and experiences have been explored and formed. Be "good at saying yes" in promoting high-quality economic development and enhancing the momentum for development. Innovation is the primary driving force for development; continuously increase fiscal investment in science and technology, driving the whole society to raise the intensity of R&D investment. Comprehensively use tools such as fiscal special funds and government investment funds to support deepening the construction of the industrial system and accelerate the cultivation of future industries. Be "good at saying yes" in solving the urgent, difficult, and anxious problems of the people and enhancing the well-being of the people's livelihood. Always adhere to the people's standpoint, wholeheartedly help the masses handle practical matters, solve difficulties, and do good deeds, ensuring that even when finances are tight, the people's livelihood is given priority, and even when finances are difficult, the people are not put in difficulty. With heart and soul, guarantee the basic livelihood of "food, clothing, housing, and transportation," satisfy the diverse livelihood of "living and working in peace and contentment," and secure the bottom-line livelihood of "safety, warmth, and cold," making the background color of happiness warmer and more solid.
Adhere to fiscal sustainability and, with the determination to "bravely break new ground," advance scientific management. The way of financial management takes upholding integrity as the foundation and innovation as the key. It is necessary to seek momentum from reform, benefits from management, and space from overall coordination, comprehensively improve the level of scientific fiscal management, and implement the requirement of living on a tight budget from the institutional and mechanistic level. Enhance fiscal sustainability through multi-channel source expansion and revenue increase. Facing the realistic challenge of a tight balance between fiscal revenue and expenditure, shift the policy goal from focusing on short-term revenue-expenditure balance to medium- and long-term fiscal sustainability, and build a policy system for sustainable fiscal development. Research and formulate guiding opinions on strengthening fiscal source expansion and revenue increase, broaden revenue-increasing channels from aspects such as strengthening the revitalization of existing land stock and improving capital operation returns, and encourage all localities to actively explore new ways to increase revenue. Take the revitalization and utilization of state-owned assets as an important path for fiscal source expansion and revenue increase, and use fiscal-financial coordination to amplify the leveraging effect of fiscal funds. Some localities have an inadequate understanding of the boundary between government and market, doing everything themselves for what the market should do, and failing to perform their duties where the government should act. It is necessary to strictly adhere to the boundary between government and market, hand over to the market what the government should not manage, reduce the government's direct allocation of resources, fully apply market mechanisms to allocate resources, and promote the transformation of fiscal fund support methods from single, uncompensated support to more leverage and guidance. Ensure policies better benefit enterprises and the people through direct, fast-reaching funds. Reform the fund support method, formulate standards for "exemption from application and direct delivery" of provincial-level fiscal funds benefiting enterprises and the people, build a service platform for the direct and fast delivery of funds benefiting enterprises, and in accordance with the requirement of "exempting everything that can be exempted and being as fast as possible," for special funds that meet the standards, in principle no longer conduct competitive applications, maximize the compression of intermediate links, reduce efficiency losses, and achieve precise drip-irrigation of policy dividends. Direct and fast delivery greatly compresses the discretionary power of government departments and the space for power rent-seeking, eradicates the soil and conditions for corruption at the source, and enables limited fiscal funds to benefit more business entities.
(The author is Secretary of the Party Leadership Group and Director-General of the Department of Finance of Jiangsu Province)
By: 自然资源部党组
The Ecological Environment Code of the People's Republic of China (hereinafter referred to as the Ecological Environment Code) officially came into effect on August 15, 2026. This is the second law in China to be named with the title "Code." It holds major and far-reaching significance for implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization and accelerating the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature. The Ecological Environment Code systematizes and codifies the major institutions for the protection and utilization of natural resources, delineating the legal benchmarks and consolidating the legal foundation for natural resource work in the new era. The natural resources system will continue to study, publicize, and implement the Ecological Environment Code, safeguard natural resources through good laws and good governance, continuously improve the governance system and enhance governance capacity, and promote high-quality economic and social development through high-level protection.
Deeply understand the major significance of implementing the Ecological Environment Code
General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized that we must always adhere to protecting the ecological environment with the strictest systems and the most rigorous rule of law. We must deeply grasp the core essence of the Ecological Environment Code and effectively improve the quality and level of its implementation.
The Ecological Environment Code is a major achievement of rule of law in implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization. The entire text of the Ecological Environment Code implements Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization, takes the comprehensive advancement of building a Beautiful China and accelerating the modernization of harmony between humanity and nature as its goals, and transforms core concepts such as "lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets" and "harmony between humanity and nature" into legal principles and institutional norms, ensuring that ecological civilization construction always advances in the correct direction.
The Ecological Environment Code comprehensively improves the system of laws and institutions for ecological civilization with Chinese characteristics. The Ecological Environment Code adopts a moderately codified model, systematically integrating separate laws and regulations in the ecological environment field and the natural resources field, resolving governance difficulties such as fragmented legislation, conflicting norms, and fragmented supervision, and forming a pattern of ecological environment rule of law that is logically unified, clearly hierarchical, and synergistically efficient. The Ecological Environment Code includes a dedicated chapter on the protection and sustainable utilization of natural resources, clarifying the legal and institutional basis for handling the relationship between development and protection and for promoting high-quality development through high-level protection.
The Ecological Environment Code provides strong legal safeguards for the natural resources department to perform its core responsibilities of "two unifications." The Ecological Environment Code codifies in the form of a code the major institutions in the natural resources field since the new era, including the unified exercise by the Ministry of Natural Resources of the owner's responsibilities for state-owned natural resource assets, the unified exercise of responsibilities for territorial spatial use regulation and ecological protection and restoration, as well as territorial spatial planning, natural resource survey and monitoring, unified registration of natural resource rights, property rights management of natural resource assets, cultivated land protection, ecological protection and restoration, and national natural resource inspection, thereby providing safeguards for consolidating the legal foundation of natural resources.
Accurately grasp the new situation and new requirements for high-level protection and utilization of natural resources
Since the establishment of the Ministry of Natural Resources, it has always deeply practiced Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization and Xi Jinping Thought on the Rule of Law, seriously studied and implemented General Secretary Xi Jinping's important instructions and directives on natural resource work, firmly established and practiced the concept that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets, continuously improved the natural resource management system, continuously optimized the territorial spatial pattern, implemented protection and restoration of important ecosystems, comprehensively improved resource utilization efficiency, and strived to be the "chief steward" of natural resources and the guardian of a Beautiful China. First, the natural resource foundation has become more solid. The red line of 1.8 billion mu of cultivated land has been firmly maintained, and a "trinity" protection pattern of quantity, quality, and ecology has initially taken shape. The target tasks for strategic mineral prospecting during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period have been fully completed, with 398 new medium and large-scale mineral deposits (oil and gas fields) of strategic minerals discovered. The national marine gross product has exceeded 11 trillion yuan. The forest coverage rate has increased to 25.09%, and the total output value of the forestry and grassland industry has reached 11 trillion yuan. The first batch of five national parks including Sanjiangyuan was established, and the Huangyan Island National Nature Reserve was newly established. Since the launch of the three landmark battles of the "Three-North" project, construction tasks exceeding 200 million mu have been completed. Second, the quality and efficiency of natural resource management have continuously improved. Adhering to optimizing increments and revitalizing stock, the construction land use area per unit of GDP nationwide decreased by 19.36% during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period. Strengthening the conservation and comprehensive utilization of mineral resources, more than 5,500 green mines above the provincial level have been established. Continuously improving the convenience of real estate registration, more than 2,300 counties and cities have implemented "Internet + real estate registration," "transfer with existing mortgage," and "delivery of houses with certificates," and the registration of natural resource rights in more than 3,800 key areas has been completed. Strengthening the supply of spatiotemporal data elements, a preliminary 3D real-scene China has been built, a national network of satellite navigation and positioning reference stations has been completed and put into operation, and the National Geomatics Center of China public service platform (Tianditu) has an average daily service call volume exceeding 1 billion times. Third, the rule of law system for natural resources has become more complete. Promoting the formulation and revision of laws and regulations such as the Land Administration Law and its implementing regulations, the Mineral Resources Law and its implementing regulations, the National Park Law, and the Nature Reserve Regulations, continuously improving the level of rule of law in natural resource governance.
The "15th Five-Year Plan" period is a critical period for consolidating the foundation and making comprehensive efforts to basically realize socialist modernization, and it is also an important period for comprehensively improving the level of natural resource protection and utilization and promoting high-quality economic and social development through high-level protection. First, greater emphasis will be placed on optimizing the development pattern. Improving the major function zoning strategy and its institutional system, deepening the reform of "multiple plans integration," and promoting the formation of a spatial development pattern with effective major function constraints and orderly territorial development. Second, greater emphasis will be placed on the efficient allocation of resource elements. Deepening the reform of factor markets, improving factor market institutions and rules, comprehensively ascertaining the baseline of existing resource assets, and revitalizing and utilizing existing resources. Third, greater emphasis will be placed on comprehensive green transformation. Adhering to the integrated protection and systematic governance of mountains, waters, forests, farmlands, grasslands, and deserts, improving ecological protection mechanisms, placing greater emphasis on improving quality, revitalizing industries, and benefiting the people, and building a major pattern of protection and governance from mountain tops to the ocean. Fourth, greater emphasis will be placed on resource security. Consolidating the basic guarantees for national security, ensuring the security of food, energy and mineral resources, key industrial chains and supply chains, and major infrastructure, and strengthening the exploration, development, and reservation of strategic mineral resources.
Deeply implement the Ecological Environment Code and promote major progress in high-level protection and utilization of natural resources
Continuously optimize the territorial spatial development pattern. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts will be focused on strengthening the major function zoning strategy, improving the territorial spatial planning system, and strengthening coordinated governance of territorial space. First, deeply implement the major function zoning strategy. Promote pilot implementation of the major function zoning system in typical regions, forming a batch of institutional achievements with strong operability that can be replicated and promoted. Research and formulate a national plan for optimizing the major function zoning strategy, promote the formation of several comprehensive spatial development units, and promote the deep integration of major national strategies. Second, improve the territorial spatial planning system. Give play to the foundational role of territorial spatial planning and strengthen the guiding and constraining role of territorial spatial planning over various special plans. Strengthen the bottom-line control of spatial security such as cultivated land and permanent basic farmland, ecological protection red lines, urban development boundaries, as well as green space system lines, water body protection lines, historical and cultural protection lines, and infrastructure construction control lines. Coordinate the needs of production, living, ecology, culture, and safety, continuously improve urban functions, optimize urban spatial structure and layout, improve urban and rural living environments, and support high-quality urban development. Third, build a "single map" for natural resource management and territorial spatial planning. Fully implement the requirements of "unified base map, unified standards, unified planning, and unified platform," coordinate and balance the spatial needs of various territorial spatial development, protection, and construction activities on the "single map," and lay a solid foundation for building a digital ecological civilization and a digital China. Comprehensively strengthen coordinated governance of territorial space, and establish and improve a territorial spatial use regulation and planning permit system that covers all types of land across the entire territory with unified and connected standards.
Comprehensively strengthen the management of natural resource assets. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, with the improvement of the property rights system for natural resource assets as the main line, efforts will be focused on ascertaining the baseline of natural resources, improving the institutional system, and promoting efficient allocation. First, advance unified survey and monitoring, rights registration, and asset inventory, statistics, and accounting. Improve the unified survey, monitoring, and evaluation system covering all types of natural resources and territorial spaces such as national parks. Expand the scope of natural resource rights registration, consolidate the achievements of the unified real estate registration reform, and deepen the widespread application of registration results in natural resource asset management. Improve the natural resource asset inventory, statistics, and accounting system, establish a technical standard system for accounting, calculate both the economic account and the ecological account, and comprehensively grasp the baseline of natural resource assets. Second, improve the institutional system for natural resource asset management. Formulate measures for the management of the list of rights for state-owned natural resource assets. Improve the systems for paid use, trading, and price management of natural resource assets. Explore the preparation of natural resource asset allocation plans and promote the combined allocation of natural resource assets. Strengthen the coordination between resource asset allocation plans and territorial spatial planning and use regulation systems, and adapt to local conditions to expand the paths for realizing the value of ecological products in the natural resources field. Third, vigorously promote the revitalization and utilization of existing land. Establish a planning and policy system more conducive to promoting the revitalization of existing land and inefficient land, implement precise policies to revitalize existing real estate land, and deeply advance the revitalization and utilization of existing land and inefficient land. Fourth, strengthen the supervision of natural resource assets. Establish a unified management system for income from state-owned natural resource assets. Strengthen whole-process supervision of natural resource protection and utilization, and continuously advance natural resource inspection and law enforcement. Explore the assessment and evaluation of entities performing duties for natural resource assets. Improve the unified reporting system for natural resources.
Deeply advance the "trinity" protection of cultivated land. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts will be focused on the quantity, quality, and ecological protection of cultivated land. First, stabilize the quantity of cultivated land. Based on natural geographical conditions and regional characteristics, implement differentiated management and control by region and category. Expand cultivated land sources through multiple channels, guide orchards, woodlands, grasslands, and other land suitable for restoration to high-quality cultivated land as supplementary sources, and gradually incorporate high-quality cultivated land formed historically in forestry and pastoral areas that can be stably utilized for a long term into the scope of cultivated land protection. Second, improve the quality of cultivated land. Prepare and implement special plans for cultivated land protection and territorial greening, and coordinate and optimize the spatial layout of agricultural land. Improve the management mechanism for the entry of superior quality into and exit of inferior quality from permanent basic farmland, and continuously increase the proportion of high-quality cultivated land within permanent basic farmland. Strengthen the protection of black soil and the treatment of acidified cultivated land, and promote the comprehensive utilization of saline-alkali land. Third, improve the ecology of cultivated land. Promote the coordinated advancement of cultivated land development and utilization and ecological protection, strengthen the systematic governance of surrounding forests, grasslands, wetlands, and sandy lands, and implement green farming. Promote the construction of farmland shelterbelts and strictly prevent the reclamation of forests, grasslands, wetlands, and other land into cultivated land.
Vigorously strengthen the protection and utilization of mineral resources. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts will be focused on mineral resource exploration and development, green mining development, and deepening reform. First, strengthen the exploration, development, and reservation of strategic mineral resources. Improve the system for coordinating and linking the exploration, production, supply, storage, and marketing of strategic mineral resources, and consolidate and enhance the position and competitiveness of the mining industry in the global industrial division of labor. Increase the coverage of regional geological surveys and mineral resource surveys, and promote the stable production and increased production of energy and mineral resources. Increase the reservation of mineral deposits and implement reserved exploration. Second, promote the comprehensive utilization of mineral resources and the green development of the mining industry. Strengthen the high-quality and efficient comprehensive utilization of important strategic minerals, promote green exploration and the construction of green mines, and make green the distinctive background of mining development. Third, deepen the reform of mineral resource management. Improve incentive mechanisms for mineral prospecting, optimize the methods for transferring mining rights, explore the establishment of exploration risk funds, create a fair and transparent market environment, and stimulate the vitality of various business entities.
Continuously strengthen the development, utilization, and protection of the ocean. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts will be focused on innovation-driven development, efficient coordination, industrial renewal, harmony between people and the sea, and win-win cooperation. First, advance innovation-driven development. Coordinate the construction of innovation platforms and major scientific and technological infrastructure in the marine field, plan and implement major national science and technology projects, strengthen basic research in marine science, and accelerate the efficient transformation and application of marine scientific and technological achievements. Second, advance efficient coordination. Adhere to the coordination of land and sea, the linkage of mountains and seas, and the integrated planning of coastal, offshore, deep-sea, and polar areas, and improve the overall efficiency of the marine economy. Third, advance industrial renewal. Vigorously develop emerging marine industries, promote the large-scale utilization of marine energy and seawater desalination, make forward-looking arrangements for deep-sea industries, the marine digital economy, and new marine materials industries, and build a modern marine industrial system. Fourth, advance harmony between people and the sea. Strengthen the classified protection of coastlines and the control of the natural coastline retention rate. Coordinate the promotion of high-level protection and high-quality development of islands. Deepen the construction of the marine ecological early warning and monitoring system and the comprehensive marine disaster prevention and mitigation system. Fifth, advance win-win cooperation. Actively participate in the formulation of international marine governance rules, deepen bilateral and multilateral marine cooperation, promote the new era Chinese marine culture, and promote the building of a maritime community with a shared future.
Coordinate the advancement of ecological protection and restoration. In accordance with the institutional provisions of the Ecological Environment Code, efforts will be focused on improving the scientific and professional level of ecological restoration. First, coordinate the implementation of major ecological protection and restoration projects. Focusing on the major regions of the "three zones and four belts" ecological security barriers, coordinate the implementation of integrated protection and restoration projects for mountains, waters, forests, farmlands, grasslands, and deserts. Strengthen the ecological restoration and governance of mines, strengthen the ecological protection and restoration of key sea areas, and promote the construction of blue bays, beautiful beaches, and harmonious islands. Fight the "Three-North" project battle and promote the decisive victory of the three landmark battles. Second, comprehensively advance the construction of a system of nature reserves with national parks as the main body. Build national parks with high quality and establish new national parks in an orderly manner. Implement the integration and optimization of nature reserves. Build a national botanical garden system. Strengthen the protection of flagship species and biodiversity. Third, continuously improve the standards, norms, and supervision and management systems for ecological restoration. Implement the requirements of the Ecological Environment Code on improving the scientific and professional level of ecological restoration, and accelerate the establishment of a standard system and the promotion and application of technology. Strengthen the supervision of ecological restoration and improve the whole-life-cycle project management system.
Natural resources are the material foundation, spatial carrier, and energy source for economic and social development. The implementation of the Ecological Environment Code has laid a solid legal foundation for the safe, efficient, and sustainable utilization of natural resources and the preservation and appreciation of asset value. We will carry out in-depth study and publicity, effectively promote the high-quality implementation of the Ecological Environment Code, safeguard lucid waters and lush mountains, and protect a Beautiful China.
Return to TopBy: 胡坚波
Since March of this year, when the basic unit of information processing by artificial intelligence models, the token, was officially named 词元 (cíyuán - "word element," the Chinese rendering of "Token"), enthusiasm for research, discussion, and practice around the token economy has surged across all sectors. At the national level, promoting the development of the token economy has been incorporated into the work system, with the construction of high-quality industry datasets and the construction of a nationally integrated computing power network as the focal points, deepening the market-oriented allocation reform of data factors, and promoting the high-quality development of the token economy. Regarding how to understand and grasp the token economy as a new economic form, the Study Times high-end think tank section publishes this article for discussion.
The token economy is a series of economic activities centered on the production, circulation, and application of tokens. It will give rise to new economic forms, accelerate the intelligent transformation of the economy and society, open new pathways for the release of data factor value, and is the part of the intelligent economy with the highest innovation density, the fastest iteration speed, and the strongest industrial driving force. China's token economy is flourishing, token invocation volume is growing exponentially, core industries are expanding rapidly, and it is accelerating its integration into all fields of the economy and society, becoming a strategic new track for developing new quality productive forces and deeply advancing the construction of Digital China.
The token economy has unique connotations and laws
A token is the smallest semantic unit of information processing by large models, the common language of deep human-machine communication, and also the common standard of measurement for the intelligent era. In 2017, Google adopted the token as the standard unit for both input and output of the Transformer architecture. In recent years, as the Transformer architecture and large language models have widely adopted tokens, tokens have gradually become the basic metering unit for model processing and text generation. In March 2026, the National Data Administration (国家数据局) officially determined the Chinese translation of Token to be 词元 (cíyuán - "word element"), and positioned it as the "value anchor of the intelligent era," making the token a hot topic in the economic and social sphere.
Tokens do not exist naturally; they are the output produced by large models through a series of "tokenization" operations including word segmentation, vector representation, positional encoding, semantic relationship modeling, contextual association analysis, and probability calculation. Through this process, data in various modalities such as text, images, and audio are transformed into semantic units that are easy to process and can be understood. Unlike bit data in digitalization, which only faithfully encodes, transmits, and stores information about the physical world, tokens, as units of meaning, can capture the semantic information behind bit data, enabling machines to "understand" the physical world. Therefore, in this sense, the token is the common language for deep communication between humans and machines, and is profoundly reshaping the relationship between humans and machines.
The production of tokens is the result of the combined action of multiple factors including data, computing power, and model inference, and is a standard of measurement that characterizes AI output. It completely breaks the physical barrier that has long made computing power (measured in FLOPs), data (measured in PB), and model algorithms (measured in parameter count) incommensurable with each other, becoming a unified yardstick that spans different technical architectures and application scenarios. The measuring function of tokens is pluralistic and universal. It can be used to measure model performance—for example, the token processing volume in the pre-training phase can directly reflect the breadth of a model's knowledge, and token generation speed can measure model inference efficiency. It can be used to measure the intelligent content of the economy and society—for example, an individual's token processing volume can reflect the degree of that person's use of AI services, a company's token consumption volume represents the degree of its digital-intelligent transformation, an industry's token usage can become an indicator for judging AI empowerment of a hundred industries, and a country's total token invocation volume can measure the scale and vitality of the national intelligent economy. It can serve as a value yardstick and settlement tool, used to measure and settle AI service fees. When everything in the physical world can be converted through tokenization into machine-processable sequences, the entire world can be computed, reorganized, and predicted, and a new bridge is established for the autonomous connection between the physical world and the digital world. The deepening advancement of the token's role as a standard of measurement will stimulate the intelligent transformation of the economy and society, thereby accelerating the historical process of human society moving toward a new era of the intelligent economy.
The connotation of the token economy and its relationship with data factor value release and the intelligent economy. The token economy is a series of economic activities centered on the production and circulation of tokens, with the application of tokens to achieve value appreciation and efficiency improvement in various fields as its extension. The token economy includes two parts: the core and the extension. Among them, the core part consists of token production and token circulation. Token production is the process of converting computing power, data, and models into tokens that carry intelligence, encompassing the computing power industry, data industry, and model industry used for token production. Token circulation is the process of achieving efficient allocation and value discovery of tokens through standardized pricing and market transactions, encompassing related industries constituted by data service providers, computing power leasing providers, model vendors, application programming interface (API) trading platforms, and others that serve the token circulation process. The extension part refers to the value appreciation brought by various industries through deep application of tokens to achieve cost savings, efficiency breakthroughs, or model innovation, and is the concentrated manifestation of the enabling effect of the token economy.
The token economy will give rise to new economic forms and accelerate the intelligent transformation of the economy and society. Every iteration and upgrade of information technology reshapes the form of information flow, thereby strengthening its value-creating capacity to guide the optimal allocation of factors such as materials and capital, ultimately triggering deep transformations in enterprise competitive advantages, industrial structure, and even economic forms. The digitalization process of the past 30-plus years was essentially about converting information from the real world into bit data that computers can process, freeing information from the constraints of physical carriers and achieving lossless replication, transmission at the speed of light, massive storage, and rapid computation, thereby giving rise to a series of epoch-making transformations such as the Internet, mobile communications, and cloud computing, forming new forms such as the network economy and information economy, and accelerating the digitalization and networking process in various fields. The development of the token economy will promote the transformation of raw data into semantic tokens, endowing machines with the intelligence of the human brain to understand complex contexts, grasp ambiguous intentions, and reason about unknown problems, bringing about a new industrial revolution, giving rise to new economic forms, and accelerating the intelligent transformation of the economy and society.
The token economy is a new pathway for the release of data factor value. From the perspective of value formation, data, as a core input, is transformed through the "tokenization" processing of large models into knowledge units that carry semantics and intelligence, enabling scattered data resources to condense into measurable value forms. From the perspective of value realization, tokens have created a new trading paradigm of "invocation is circulation, billing is settlement," which, without directly trading raw data, can complete the standardized release and large-scale monetization of data value within a closed-loop commercial application, providing a practical and feasible pathway for solving the difficulties of data rights confirmation, pricing, and circulation, and serving as an important breakthrough for promoting the market-oriented allocation reform of data factors.
The token economy is the core subset and value hub of the intelligent economy. As a new stage in the development and evolution of the digital economy, the intelligent economy is a macroeconomic new form with rich connotations and broad extensions, while the token economy is its core subset, carrying large models—the most advanced technological form of the current intelligent economy—and concentrating the deep integration of the three major factors of data, algorithms, and computing power. It is the part of the intelligent economy with the highest innovation density, the fastest iteration speed, and the strongest industrial driving force. As a unified standard of measurement, tokens convert intangible intelligent services into standardized commodities that can be priced and settled, enabling the commercial exchange and market competition of the entire intelligent economy to operate efficiently, greatly expanding the value creation boundary of the intelligent economy. The two are deeply integrated and inseparable. The broad demand of the intelligent economy provides application scenarios and value destinations for the token economy, while the token economy defines the development boundary of the intelligent economy through cutting-edge innovation, determines the commercial efficiency of the intelligent economy through unified measurement, and profoundly shapes the evolutionary logic of the intelligent economy.
The token economy has unique techno-economic laws. First, ultra-large-scale economies. The core factors of the token economy—data, algorithms, and computing power—all possess strong economies of scale. Training models with hundreds of billions of parameters requires investment in clusters of tens of thousands of graphics processing units (GPUs) and enormous amounts of electricity; the collection, cleaning, and annotation of massive high-quality data is extremely costly; and top-tier talent reserves for algorithms and long-term research and development likewise require sustained high-intensity investment. However, once these initial thresholds are crossed, the marginal cost of each additional token approaches zero. The economies of scale of the token economy are the superimposed amplification of the triple economies of scale of data, algorithms, and computing power, forming the most powerful form of economies of scale. This will profoundly affect enterprise competition models, change industrial structure and market structure, and reshape national competitive advantages. It also means that the entry ticket to competition in the core layer of the token economy is extremely expensive—only super-enterprises and superpowers with enormous market scale, abundant capital reserves, and complete technology ecosystems possess the basic conditions to participate in competition.
Second, nonlinear growth. The token economy follows a typical nonlinear growth trajectory. The exponential expansion of computing power provides the material foundation for continuous multiplication, the data flywheel effect accelerates the industrial cycle, algorithms are iterating at an accelerating pace, and each generational breakthrough causes intelligence levels to leap upward. Driven by the combined force of these three forces, token invocation volume explodes along an exponential curve, per-token cost declines rapidly along an accelerating trajectory, and application penetration spreads from a few scenarios to a hundred industries at an accelerating pace. This process is essentially an accelerating intelligence explosion, with a diffusion speed far exceeding that of any previous general-purpose technology. For enterprises, linear growth strategic planning will become completely ineffective, and enterprises unable to keep up with the exponential curve will be rapidly eliminated. For countries, the nation that first builds a sustainable development ecosystem for the token economy will form an overwhelming first-mover advantage, the window for latecomers to catch up is drastically compressed, and the rise and fall of national strength will directly depend on the ability to grasp the laws of nonlinear growth.
Third, non-homogeneity. Although the token is a unified metering unit, its intrinsic value is not homogeneous. In different fields and scenarios, the information density and technological value-added carried by a single token are stratified. "Low-density tokens" used for simple daily conversation and routine retrieval are information-sparse, consuming computing power while producing little output; while "high-density tokens" used for complex logical reasoning, multimodal generation, and high-level decision-making have a fundamentally different data purity, algorithmic complexity, and computing power consumption intensity behind them. This law determines that the token market will not move toward homogenized unified pricing, but will inevitably follow the law of information density and evolve into a laddered, finely differentiated value stratification system anchored on output efficiency and value-added. The competitiveness of the token economy depends not only on total scale, but also on whether scarce computing power and data resources can be channeled into high-information-density knowledge production fields, which will directly determine the development quality and competitive position of a country's token economy.
The token economy has entered a new stage of accelerated development
Currently, as artificial intelligence develops in depth, token consumption is leaping exponentially. The token has transcended a single technological concept and evolved into a new economic unit for measuring enterprise productivity and core costs. The industrial chain reconstructed around its value is accelerating its formation, and the token economy has entered a new stage of high-quality development.
Token invocation volume is growing exponentially. Driven by multiple forces including model technology breakthroughs, rapid industrial scale expansion, and accelerated application deployment, token usage is showing an exponential growth trend. From a global perspective, the model API aggregation platform OpenRouter previously had an average annual token invocation volume of approximately 10 trillion, and by 2025 its average daily invocation volume had reached approximately 1 trillion—about 10 days of invocation volume can reach the level of one previous year. Domestic growth is even more astonishing. China's average daily token invocation volume started from 100 billion at the beginning of 2024 and exceeded 500 trillion by June 2026, a growth of more than 5,000 times; compared with 140 trillion in March 2026, it has grown more than 2.5 times in just three months.
Core industries of the token economy are accelerating their development. From the perspective of token production, computing power scale is growing rapidly. As of the end of 2025, the number of standard racks in computing centers in use nationwide exceeded 13 million, with total computing power reaching 300 EFLOPS, of which intelligent computing power accounted for more than 40%, providing a solid foundation for large-scale token production. A high-quality data supply system is accelerating its formation. In 2025, China's data industry scale reached 6.8 trillion yuan; as of the end of June 2026, the country had built 120,000 high-quality datasets with a total volume exceeding 1,565 petabytes (PB), providing sufficient corpus supply for token production. In 2025, the scale of China's artificial intelligence core industry exceeded 1.2 trillion yuan, and the proportion of industrial scale from large models directly and related services is leaping rapidly. Model training is shifting from general pre-training to industry knowledge injection, and the accelerated emergence of vertical domain large models is promoting the upgrade of tokens toward high-density professional services. From the perspective of token circulation, API pay-per-volume pricing is becoming the mainstream service model in the industry, and the standardized intelligent service market is accelerating its formation. At the same time, industry consensus on token pricing is beginning to shift toward value orientation, and the value discovery and resource allocation functions of the token circulation link are becoming increasingly mature. Some globally leading enterprises have proposed adopting a five-tier token pricing system, pricing tokens by task complexity in tiers; leading domestic cloud vendors have already launched differentiated pricing strategies that distinguish general scenarios from professional vertical scenarios such as finance and healthcare. This trend marks that the token pricing system is moving from crude unified pricing toward refined, market-oriented value stratification, laying the foundation for the reasonable distribution of token value across all links of the industrial chain.
Token application fields are expanding rapidly. Currently, tokens are accelerating their integration into all fields of production and life, with the digital field as the pioneering front. Some large model enterprises have made tokens the "fourth compensation pillar" after wages, bonuses, and equity; others have established "token budgets," incorporating token consumption, utilization efficiency, and business output into performance evaluation systems. At the same time, token applications in finance, healthcare, manufacturing, and other fields are accelerating their development. Financial institutions use tokens to measure risk control costs and as settlement tools; healthcare institutions use tokens to account for AI-assisted diagnosis fees; and the manufacturing industry uses them as production scheduling indicators and is gradually embedding them into core business processes. In addition, token consumption is also rising rapidly, with the three major telecom operators successively launching token packages. Although there were initial problems such as chaotic and opaque token package standards, as token consumption gradually becomes standardized, it is accelerating its integration into residents' digital lives. Historical experience shows that the penetration of a technology or product from professional technical circles into everyday public use is an important marker and driving force for large-scale development, and there is an urgent need to accelerate the healthy and rapid development of token consumption.
Various localities are accelerating their strategic layout of the token economy. Currently, more and more localities have issued or are preparing to issue industrial policies for the token economy. Guangdong took the lead in issuing the first provincial-level special policy for the token economy in China, constructing a full-chain system from data supply to token going global; Hangzhou issued the "Hangzhou Artificial Intelligence Industry Development Promotion Regulations (Draft)," making institutional arrangements for promoting production, allocation, and use, and supporting the layout and development of the token economy; Sichuan innovatively launched "token vouchers," shifting the focus of subsidies from computing power construction to application consumption; Beijing incorporated token consumption into the support scope of enterprise intelligent transformation; and so on. The construction of token factories in various localities is accelerating. Shanghai, relying on the Lingang intelligent computing park, has built the first ten-thousand-card-level token production cluster, with per-token inference cost declining by 40%; the Guiyang Gui'an New Area (贵阳贵安新区), leveraging its green electricity advantages, is building the largest token production base in the southwest, planning to deploy 100,000 GPU accelerator cards and attracting more than 10 leading AI enterprises to settle in; the Chengdu-Chongqing region, relying on the national integrated computing power network hub nodes, is building western token factories, forming token production capacity with coordinated computing power, data, and models.
The innovative development of the token economy faces new challenges
The vigorous development of the token economy has brought a series of new opportunities, but it has also brought all-around impacts and challenges to the data supply system, digital-computing-network-electricity infrastructure, industrial ecology, and governance mechanisms.
The data supply system is still difficult to adapt to the urgent needs of token production. To promote large models from general capability competition to deep industry application, high-quality industry data containing profound industry logic, professional terminology, and causal reasoning chains, multimodal alignment data, and highly precise annotated data become the key factors determining the upper limit of model capability and the value density of individual tokens. Currently, the data supply system is clearly lagging behind this trend. First, the construction of high-quality datasets is relatively insufficient. Although the construction of high-quality datasets is accelerating, the supply of "AI-ready data" for token production remains insufficient. A large amount of industry data remains in a scattered, unstructured, unannotated raw state, making it difficult to meet model requirements, and the supporting role of professional domain data governance, annotation tools, and intelligent preprocessing capabilities has not yet been brought into play, lacking an efficient channel for transformation from "usable data" to "AI-ready data." Second, the development and utilization mechanism for public data resources is not yet sound. A large amount of high-value government data, scientific research data, and public utility data has not been effectively released, and the problem of data-holding departments being "unwilling, afraid, and unable" to open up remains prominent, hindering the transformation of public data into high-quality datasets. Third, data circulation and utilization channels are not smooth enough. The implementation of the data property rights system still needs to be deepened, compliant circulation rules need to be improved, security-trusted technical facilities have not yet been popularized, and the supply and demand of high-quality data cannot yet achieve efficient matching. It is necessary to promote the accelerated transformation of the data supply system from supplementing quantity to improving quality, and from general corpus as the mainstay to high-quality industry datasets as the core, so as to consolidate the data foundation for the development of the token economy.
Digital, computing, network, and electricity infrastructure faces new demands for comprehensive upgrading and deep coordination. First, data infrastructure urgently needs to enhance its integrated support capability for multi-model tokens. Different models have different computational performance, adapted business scenarios, and token usage costs, and complex token businesses need to flexibly switch models according to actual needs. However, existing data infrastructure does not yet possess the capability for unified access and integrated deployment and scheduling of multiple models, making it difficult to efficiently manage cross-model tool invocation and unified context management, which constrains the full release of token business value. Second, the token economy places high demands on network carrying capacity. Currently, network facilities are mainly adapted to traditional traffic-type businesses, lacking low-latency, high-throughput, high-security full-domain token carrying, high-speed transmission, and intelligent distribution capabilities, making it difficult to guarantee the cross-regional, large-scale, high-concurrency invocation of trillions or even quadrillions of tokens per day. Third, pressure on computing power and energy security supply continues to increase. Domestic computing power still shows insufficient support capability in adapting to large-scale inference, and the software-hardware collaborative ecosystem needs to be improved. The layout of computing power is still unbalanced, with regional resource distribution misaligned with token invocation demand, making it difficult to flexibly allocate according to business scale. The enormous electricity consumption of large model training and inference continues to rise, the pressure for green and low-carbon supply is becoming increasingly prominent, and the coordinated layout of computing and electricity urgently needs to be strengthened.
The potential of the token economy has not yet been fully released. Currently, China's token economy is in an accelerated cultivation period, and compared with the strategic needs of the digital economy and intelligent economy development, its potential still needs to be deeply activated. First, the core industrial ecology is not yet mature. The business model of the token economy is relatively singular; the current main profit model is basic API invocation, the deep monetization pathway based on token value has not yet been opened, and innovative business models such as value-added services and pay-for-performance around tokens are still in the exploration stage. Market concentration is high, the gap in token service acquisition capability between leading enterprises and small and medium-sized enterprises is obvious, and inclusive supply is insufficient. The level of token consumption is relatively low, the proportion of enterprise token expenditure in digitalization investment is not high, consumer categories are dominated by general conversation tokens, and the proportion of high-value industry tokens is relatively low. Second, the breadth and depth of application empowerment are insufficient. From the current actual situation, token applications are still mainly point-based breakthroughs in leading industries such as large models, the Internet, and finance, while the penetration rate in mainstay industries of the national economy such as manufacturing and agriculture is relatively low. Small and medium-sized enterprises face difficulties such as relatively high invocation costs and a lack of adapted tools, and the phenomenon of "cannot afford to use, do not know how to use" is relatively common. The cross-industry, cross-scenario economies of scale are far from being formed, and the potential to empower a hundred industries has not yet been effectively released.
Industrial policies for the token economy and the macro-coordinated governance mechanism cannot yet adapt to the logic of tokenization. First, industrial policies urgently need to strengthen value orientation. Currently, local token economy policies mostly focus on server procurement and computing power scale subsidies, with insufficient guidance for key links such as high-quality dataset construction, industry model fine-tuning, high-value token output, and application. In some regions, signs of homogenization have already appeared in token factory construction, with the risk of blindly following trends and concept speculation rising, and some projects face difficulties such as low utilization rates and insufficient profitability after going into operation. There is a lack of differentiated policy incentives oriented by token value density and industry empowerment effects, and there is a failure to effectively guide localities to lay out token production capacity according to local conditions. Second, the market regulatory system clearly lags behind the new form of the token economy. In the token production and distribution link, there are regulatory blind spots in training data copyright compliance, data security review, and inference content risk control; in the token trading and consumption link, billing rules are opaque, lacking unified metering standards, interface specifications, and quality grading standards, and chaos such as fake token traffic and low-quality services dumping at low prices has begun to appear; in the market structure of the token economy, leading model enterprises and computing power platforms, relying on technological advantages and user lock-in, are forming a vertical integration trend, with market concentration rising rapidly, posing new challenges to competition policy and antitrust governance. Third, the unique operational logic of the token economy brings new challenges to the macro-governance system. For example, the token economy may give rise to the difficult problem of partial inflation in core industries coexisting with deflation in other economic fields, increasing the difficulty of monetary policy balance. In addition, there is an imbalance in the distribution of industrial benefits within the token economy, with hardware infrastructure accounting for too high a proportion, suppressing downstream innovation vitality and value returns. The statistical accounting system for tokens is absent, and the measurement framework for output and consumption is blank, making it difficult to support scientific decision-making. The cross-domain circulation of tokens exacerbates the divergence between tax sources and tax bases, raising new requirements for the adaptability of the traditional tax system and increasing the difficulty of inter-regional interest coordination.
Promoting the high-quality development of the token economy
Looking to the future, China urgently needs to strengthen overall planning and deployment, strengthen the supply of high-quality data, consolidate the digital-computing-network-electricity foundation, deepen industrial integration, and innovate the governance system, so as to promote the healthy and rapid development of the token economy and transform China's advantages in massive scenarios, data, and energy into new advantages in global artificial intelligence competition.
Strengthen the supply of high-quality data and improve the quality and efficiency of token production. First, strengthen the construction of high-quality datasets. Deeply implement a new round of action plans for high-quality dataset construction, focus on key industries such as finance, healthcare, and manufacturing, accelerate the advancement of pilot initiatives, create "AI-Ready" high-quality datasets that are technically feasible, practical and convenient, and quality-assured, open up the transformation channel from raw data to model-usable corpus, promote the shift of corpus supply from scale expansion to quality leap, and improve the adaptability of data supply to token production demand. Second, accelerate the promotion of public data development and utilization. Accelerate the establishment of a responsibility system for the development and utilization of public data resources, clarify the responsibilities and boundaries of data-holding departments for opening and sharing, and stimulate the motivation for public data supply. Accelerate the promotion of authorized operation of public data, deepen the construction of "public data in motion" scenarios, orderly release the potential of public data resources, and broaden the public data sources for token production. Third, deepen data circulation and utilization. Promote the accelerated implementation of the structural separation system for data property rights, and improve data trading circulation rules and compliance standards. Cultivate third-party professional service institutions such as data brokerage, compliance review, and quality assessment, and promote the high-quality development of data circulation services. Open up the channels for the efficient circulation and value release of data factors in links such as token production and model training, and support the high-quality development of the token economy with unimpeded data circulation.
Optimize digital-computing-network-electricity infrastructure and consolidate the foundation for the development of the token economy. First, strengthen the overall coordination of digital-computing-network-electricity. Break the isolated planning approach for computing power, data, and energy, deepen the construction of the computing-electricity coordination mechanism, promote the deep coordination of computing power networks and power systems, and guide data centers to transform into high-energy-efficiency token factories. Second, enhance the scheduling capability of multi-model coordination. Encourage the research, development, and deployment of new data infrastructure platforms with unified access for multiple models and seamless scheduling of heterogeneous computing power, integrate token scheduling into the "East Data, West Computing" project (东数西算), optimize the cross-regional coordinated allocation of tokens, and reduce the technical barriers and friction costs for enterprises in cross-model invocation of complex tasks. Third, upgrade the full-domain token carrying network. Targeting the needs of cross-agent collaboration, accelerate the construction of a next-generation trusted data transmission network with low latency, high throughput, and high reliability, providing physical channels for millisecond-level token flow and intelligent distribution.
Promote the deep integration of token-related technological innovation and industrial innovation, and fully release the potential of the token economy. First, strengthen independent technological innovation. Accelerate the iterative upgrade of domestic AI chips and efficient inference frameworks, break through the computing power bottleneck of large-scale token training and inference, and enhance the adaptability of domestic computing power to multi-model, high-concurrency token businesses. Strengthen innovation in key data technologies such as data synthesis, knowledge engineering, multimodal alignment, and highly precise annotation, and build an independent, controllable, safe, and reliable technological foundation for the token economy. Second, innovate business models. Explore diversified billing methods based on token value, promote new business models such as pay-for-performance, value-added subscriptions, and token credit, and change the current single profit pattern dominated by basic API invocation. Encourage cloud service providers and model enterprises to launch inclusive token service packages, reduce the computing cost and model invocation threshold for small and medium-sized enterprises, and promote the upgrade of token consumption from "general conversation" to "professional application." Third, deepen token application empowerment. Focusing on key fields such as finance, healthcare, manufacturing, education, and government affairs, organize and implement token application demonstration projects, and create a batch of high-value, replicable benchmark scenarios. Build supply-demand docking platforms, promote efficient adaptation between model research and development and industry applications, promote deep cooperation between upstream and downstream of the industrial chain, accelerate the formation of a positive interaction in which demand drives supply and supply creates demand, and fully release the enormous potential of the token economy to empower a hundred industries.
Improve industrial policies, the regulatory system, and the coordinated governance mechanism, and optimize the development environment of the token economy. First, improve industrial policies. Accelerate the research and formulation of special policies for promoting the high-quality development of the token economy, guide localities to lay out token factories according to local conditions, and avoid homogenized construction and concept speculation. Establish an incentive system oriented by token value density and industry empowerment effects, guide funds toward key links such as high-quality dataset construction, industry model fine-tuning, and high-value application scenarios, and promote the upgrade of token consumption from low-density general scenarios to high-value professional scenarios. Second, improve laws, regulations, standards, and the regulatory system. Accelerate the formulation of standards for token metering, classification and grading, and quality assessment, unify API interface specifications and billing rules, and regulate market order. Improve the full-chain security protection system covering data collection, model training, and token generation, strengthen training data copyright compliance and inference content risk control. Explore the establishment of a token market concentration monitoring and antitrust early warning mechanism to maintain fair competition order. Improve the rule system for tokens going global, and promote international computing power cooperation and cross-border collaboration in the token economy. Third, strengthen coordinated governance. Accelerate the construction of a statistical monitoring system for the token economy, incorporating token output, consumption, and circulation into the digital economy accounting framework. Closely monitor the divergence of upstream and downstream price trends, and prevent the interference of the coexistence of structural inflation and deflation with monetary policy transmission. Research tax distribution mechanisms adapted to the cross-domain circulation of tokens, solve the problem of tax source divergence, and promote inter-regional interest coordination.
(The author is the Director of the National Data Development Research Institute (国家数据发展研究院))
Return to TopBy: 高蕴恒
Modern air attack weapons are developing toward extreme speed, extreme stealth, and extreme miniaturization. The continuous employment of saturation attacks, penetration strikes, top-down assaults, unmanned swarm attacks, and other air attack means on the modern battlefield has caused air defense and anti-missile operations to face multi-dimensional, multi-domain, and multi-directional threats. Merely improving the performance of air defense weapon platforms cannot cope with complex, diverse, and 瞬息万变 (shùn xī wàn biàn - "changes in an instant," rapidly changing) air attacks. Only by being based on the system, integrated into the system, relying on the system, employing the system, and giving play to the effectiveness of the system can one seek the initiative from a passive position.
First, focusing on changes in air attack, clarify the task positioning of system-based air defense.
Through local conflicts in recent years, it can be found that air attacks emphasize both "hard kill" and "soft kill," both "long-range kill" and "close-range kill," both "point kill" and "swarm kill," and both "fast kill" and "precision kill," making air defense operational tasks more complex and changeable.
Resisting full-domain diversified attacks. Unmanned intelligence and stealth penetration relying on platform advantages, cluster saturation and omnidirectional attacks relying on numerical advantages, extreme-speed breakthroughs and precision strikes relying on speed advantages, and integrated soft-hard and agile actions relying on network-electromagnetic advantages have caused the spear of air attack to develop toward full-domain, multi-dimensional, and diversified directions. This inevitably brings about the transformation of air defense operational guidance from fighting alone to system integration, the transformation of air defense operational concepts from traditional passive area defense to active cross-domain defense, and the transformation of air defense operational tasks from traditional air defense and anti-missile to air defense, space defense, network-electromagnetic defense, anti-unmanned, anti-hypersonic, and anti-near-space operations—being proficient in both "traditional routines" and "extraordinary means."
Resisting long-range precision strikes. Beyond-visual-range and precision strikes have become the norm in air attack operations. With the enhancement of wireless transmission technology, the improvement of positioning and navigation accuracy, and the elevation of composite guidance levels, future air attack operations will inevitably develop toward the "two poles" of standoff precision strikes outside the defense zone and unmanned strikes inside the defense zone. Air defense operations must not only respond to the threats of stealth fighters and cruise missiles, but will also face platform threats such as drone swarms, loitering munitions, and hypersonic missiles; not only must they respond to the rapid strikes of incoming weapons approaching the defense zone, but they must also implement precision interception against air attack platforms outside the defense zone. It is necessary to both "扬汤止沸 (yáng tāng zhǐ fèi - "stir the soup to stop it boiling," to apply a temporary remedy)" and, even more, "釜底抽薪 (fǔ dǐ chōu xīn - "pull firewood from under the cauldron," to address the root cause)."
Resisting integrated soft-hard attacks. Firepower strikes, network attacks, and electronic jamming attacks have become the "three axes" of air attack operations. Especially the side that possesses network-electromagnetic advantages in air attacks usually uses network warfare and electronic warfare means as the "vanguard," implementing dense network-electromagnetic attacks to paralyze the opponent's command hub and interfere with the opponent's frequency-using equipment, and then uses firepower to implement point strikes, achieving precise and rapid system destruction. For this reason, air defense operations must not only give play to the "hard destruction" effectiveness of traditional firepower, but must also weave a dense network-electromagnetic "soft hedgehog armor," strengthen the capability to resist network intrusion and electromagnetic interference, and be able to achieve both "physical destruction" and "functional failure."
Resisting dense saturation attacks. To reduce the cost of air attack operations, in several recent local conflicts, saturation attacks by low-cost air attack platforms such as FPV drones and loitering munitions have become one of the important means of breaking through air defense systems. It can be foreseen that, with the continuous maturation of technologies such as autonomous learning and swarm control, responding to self-organizing, adaptive, and autonomous strikes by drones and loitering munitions will become a new subject in air defense and anti-missile operations—being able to respond both to small-formation, large-payload single-direction dense attacks by large air attack platforms, and to small-payload, multi-formation multi-directional saturation attacks by small and micro air attack platforms; being able to resist both "a thousand-mile wild dash" and "a swarm of bees in chaotic dance."
Second, focusing on changes in tasks, clarify the capability requirements of system-based air defense.
The integrated development of air attack toward unmanned, stealth, intelligent, and clustered directions has put forward clearer requirement orientations for the construction of air defense operational capabilities, namely full-domain, distributed, flexible, agile, hybrid, and multi-dimensional.
Full-domain networking requirements. Full-domain and integrated are the inherent requirements for system-based air defense. The key to achieving full-domain and integrated lies in an efficiently interconnected operational network system. On the one hand, it is necessary to possess rapid networking and link-building capabilities, ensuring stable transmission of the operational situation during rapid movement and under link failure conditions, which is more conducive to fire terminal response; on the other hand, it is necessary to possess real-time command and control capabilities, realizing the cross-interconnection of "personnel, machines, and situational awareness," opening up the bridge between detection and strike, and enabling the interconnection and intercommunication of all fire units.
Distributed operations requirements. Distributed and adaptive are the key requirements for system-based air defense. Achieving distributed and adaptive requires satisfying two conditions: preservation of combat power and aggregation of advantages during movement. Drawing on the thinking of "Mosaic Warfare," the air defense and anti-missile operational system is "deconstructed" to form many small systems, with weapon platforms dispersed and deployed across multi-dimensional battlefields such as land, sea, air, space, underwater, network, and electromagnetic domains. In peacetime, they maintain low-energy operation; in wartime, they rapidly activate and enter combat based on established orders, achieving the effect of "scattered, they are stars in the sky; gathered, they are a single flame."
Rapid capability assembly requirements. Standardization and plug-and-play capability are the foundational requirements for system-based air defense. The key to achieving standardization and plug-and-play capability lies in being able to carry out "self-reorganization" of the operational system on the basis of distributed and adaptive operations. Technologies such as autonomous learning, autonomous planning, and adaptive adjustment can be used to rapidly adjust forces online, rapidly reorganize elements, and rapidly restore combat capability according to the system structure and the attrition situation of operational objectives, using efficient "resilient readiness for change" capability to exploit gaps in the enemy's defenses and strike key nodes of air attack.
Agile response requirements. Agility and rapid response are the core requirements for system-based air defense. The key to achieving agility and rapid response lies in being able to detect targets under any complex conditions, being able to "see, aim accurately, and strike hard." While leveraging combat technology means to resist enemy network-electromagnetic interference and making good use of traditional reconnaissance means, emphasis is placed on giving play to the effectiveness of new technologies such as big data and cloud computing, aggregating intelligence information, precisely assessing air attack indications, relying on a high-density and highly efficient network-information system to transmit air situation information "without tampering and without time lag," making full preparations, and delivering a strike against the enemy.
Hybrid resistance requirements. Hybridization and joint operations are important requirements for system-based air defense. The key to achieving joint and hybrid operations lies in the mixed employment of multiple services and arms, multiple dimensions, multiple domains, and multiple means. On the basis of using anti-aircraft artillery and missiles with precision, it is necessary to make good use of new-domain and new-quality forces such as network-electromagnetic, laser, microwave, and electromagnetic railgun means. Not only can "hard kills" be achieved through firepower, but "soft kills" can also be achieved through new means and new forces. While demonstrating the powerful system operational capability, cognitive attacks are also conducted against the enemy, achieving "countering hybrid with hybrid."
Multi-dimensional support requirements. Intensification and sustainability are the support requirements for system-based air defense. The key to achieving intensification and sustainability lies in being able to use multiple means to implement precise support and achieve slow consumption of operational resources and potential. This requires the support system to be able to fight both "quick decisive battles" and "protracted wars," adopting pre-storage and containerized support models, pre-stocking sufficient resources, and using technologies such as blockchain and the Internet of Things to precisely allocate support resources, achieving point-to-point intelligent, visualized, and precise support, and coping with complex combat situations over the long term.
Third, focusing on changes in requirements, clarify the focus of effort for system-based air defense.
System-based air defense is not confined to improving the effectiveness of a single platform, but rather focuses on integrating the air defense forces of all services and arms into one body. Its key lies in being based on the system, integrated into the system, relying on the system, and employing the system, achieving the effect of "1+1>2" through giving play to the system effect.
Command architecture systematization. After years of development, air defense operations—whether viewed from the command levels of strategy, campaign, and tactics, or from the command processes of analyzing and assessing the situation, making operational decisions, assigning operational tasks, and organizing and implementing actions, or from the composition of commanders and command organs and their elements—are relatively fixed and complete, with clear command responsibilities and command authority. Moreover, air attack weapons are relatively slower in speed, which can leave sufficient time for commanders at all levels and command organs to "judge, decide, and handle." As air attack weapons become faster and air situation changes become more complex, the "window" left for command organs to handle situations is smaller. Usually, a command chain directly from the strategic decision-making level to the fire terminal is constructed, and the autonomous command space of lower-level commanders is small. There is an urgent need to compress command levels to gain maneuvering time.
Information network systematization. In the informationized and intelligent era, the development of operational systems and command systems toward systematization will inevitably drive the development of information networks toward systematization. It is not possible to consider only the requirements of a single service or arm for the technical architecture, operating system, and data standards of the information network. Rather, on the basis of existing information systems, gridding technology is used, and following the "distributed, open" system architecture thinking, in accordance with operational data standards, the air situation data format is unified, and system components such as reconnaissance and early warning, command and control, counterattack operations, firepower-electromagnetic strikes, and battlefield support are modularly embedded, establishing corresponding usable "data pools." Then, through cross-element data access protocols, key setting, and other means, an "information cloud" for air defense, anti-missile, and anti-hypersonic operations is constructed that can access on demand, plug-and-retrieve, and share situational awareness, realizing seamless real-time sharing of information data.
Weapon platform systematization. Weapon platforms are the terminal end of system-based air defense. In the past, land-based firepower strike platforms such as surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft artillery could engage targets at speeds of around Mach 3, and their munitions were mostly fragmentation kill, which could still meet the requirements of engaging fighters and cruise missiles. However, when confronting high-speed, high-lethality targets such as ballistic missiles and hypersonic weapons, they appear 捉襟见肘 (zhuō jīn jiàn zhǒu - "pull the lapel and expose the elbow," to be inadequate for the task). This inevitably drives weapon platforms to possess more diversified operational capabilities and to take into account multiple functions. In terms of strike platforms, relying on the network-information system to connect various firepower strike platforms into the network and establish links, with real-time data sharing, relay resistance is achieved; in terms of comprehensive support, the concepts of integration, intensification, and pre-storage are strengthened, and relying on Internet of Things technology, an "intelligent resource allocation system" is developed to connect various operational platforms, sense troop requirements in real time, understand resource inventories, and dynamically allocate resources, achieving on-demand support and improving support efficiency.
Return to TopBy: 李让
Entering the Anti-Japanese War Weapons Hall of the Military Museum of the Chinese People's Revolution, one sees a Type 24 Maxim heavy machine gun on display. The brass water-cooling jacket is covered with dents and weld-repair marks, and the canvas ammunition belt guide channel bears the wear of long years of use. This museum artifact is both a relic of modern Chinese standard-issue military industry and a physical testament to the Chinese military and people's 自力更生 (zì lì gēng shēng - "rely on oneself to regenerate," self-reliance) and 攻坚克难 (gōng jiān kè nán - "attack the hard, overcome the difficult," tackling tough problems).
In 1884, Maxim developed the world's first fully automatic water-cooled heavy machine gun, with a theoretical rate of fire of 600 rounds per minute and an effective range of over one kilometer. On the first day of the Battle of the Somme in World War I, it caused nearly 60,000 British casualties. In the late Qing dynasty, the gun was introduced under the name "Lightning Gun" (赛电枪), and the Jinling (金陵) and Dagu (大沽) arsenals attempted to reverse-engineer it.
In 1934, the Nationalist government obtained the blueprints for the German MG08 Maxim heavy machine gun, and the Jinling Arsenal finalized the Type 24 Maxim heavy machine gun in 1935, with a caliber of 7.92 mm and a total weight of 49 kilograms, making it standard equipment of the Chinese army. By 1948, over 35,000 had been produced in total. The brass water-cooling jacket was highly distinctive, and soldiers affectionately called it the "Old Yellow Ox" (老黄牛). It was the main heavy machine gun of the Chinese military during the Anti-Japanese War, playing an important role on both the frontal battlefield and the enemy's rear battlefield.
After the Marco Polo Bridge Incident, the disparity in heavy firepower between China and Japan was enormous. A Japanese Type A standing division at full strength had approximately 25,000 men, equipped with 98 Type 92 heavy machine guns and 96 artillery pieces of various types, supplemented by large numbers of light machine guns and grenade dischargers, with ample and stable ammunition supplies. A Chinese adjusted division (commonly known as a German-equipped division) at full strength had 14,000 men, with 72 Type 24 Maxim heavy machine guns and 12 75mm mountain guns in its establishment, with 82mm mortars at the regimental level. The Eighth Route Army in the early period after reorganization had a total of over 40,000 men throughout the entire force, with only about 100 heavy machine guns of mixed models with non-interchangeable parts, an average of fewer than 1,000 rounds of ammunition per machine gun, and only a very small number of captured mountain guns and mortars, making resupply extremely difficult.
Relying solely on battlefield captures could not fill the enormous gap in equipment and ammunition, and the base areas' self-reliant military industry became the only way to make up for the shortfall in firepower. In the summer of 1939, the Eighth Route Army headquarters selected Huangyadong (黄崖洞) in Licheng County (黎城县) in the Taihang Mountains to establish an arsenal, which went into production the following year, becoming the largest military industrial base in the enemy's rear in North China. Relying on natural caves for concealed production, it blazed the path of the people's military industry's self-reliance.
Facing the "three lacks" predicament of no precision machine tools, no standard steel, and no chemical raw materials, the military industrial personnel 就地取材 (jiù dì qǔ cái - "obtain materials from the local area," using local resources). They built tower-type sulfuric acid distillation devices from large ceramic pickle jars used by the common people, independently producing propellant and explosives; they recovered discarded cartridge cases, scrap railway tracks, and agricultural tool steel to forge bullet heads and cartridge cases, batch-reloading ammunition, greatly alleviating the predicament of heavy weapons like the Maxim having "guns but no bullets"; they manually repaired and fitted firing pins, locking springs, belt links, and other easily worn parts, returning large numbers of battle-damaged "disabled guns" to the battlefield. At its peak, the Huangyadong Arsenal had nearly 1,000 workers and over 40 pieces of production equipment, producing at most 430 rifles and over 2,000 artillery shells per month, with an annual weapons output capable of equipping 16 regiments, effectively supporting frontline troops in combat.
In addition, the people's army used meticulous management, flexible tactics, and fighting spirit to dismantle the Japanese military's technical superiority layer by layer.
In equipment, they were 精打细算 (jīng dǎ xì suàn - "calculate carefully and in detail," meticulous budgeting). Heavy machine guns were uniformly controlled at the regimental level, and combat use required approval from higher authorities. They could not be fired at will except for core missions such as ambushes, blocking actions, and assaults on fortified positions. After combat, all cartridge cases had to be recovered and uniformly turned over to the arsenal for reloading. During marches, the gun body, tripod, and water-cooling jacket were disassembled and carried by separate personnel, with indiscriminate discarding strictly prohibited, maximizing the service life of the machine guns.
In tactics, they adhered to asymmetric warfare centered on night combat, close combat, long-distance raids, and surprise attacks, adopting dispersed concealment, multi-route harassment, and hit-and-run tactics, fully leveraging our army's advantages, restricting the mobility of the enemy's heavy equipment, and dismantling the space for the enemy's heavy firepower to be brought into play.
In combat, Maxim machine gun squads often became key targets of Japanese attacks, and countless soldiers bled and sacrificed to protect the Maxim. In the battles of Huangtuling (黄土岭) and the defense of North and South Daigu (南北岱崮), commanders and fighters relied on crude earth-and-stone fortifications, using a small number of Maxim machine guns combined with bayonet charges to withstand repeated charges by several times their number of enemy troops; military industrial personnel braved enemy bomber raids to hold the military production lines; women in the base areas spun cloth to make machine gun ammunition belts; the masses 节衣缩食 (jié yī suō shí - "save on clothing and reduce food," economizing on necessities) to donate steel, saltpeter, and other military industrial raw materials, and risked death to transport military industrial equipment.
The national conviction of 救亡图存 (jiù wáng tú cún - "save from extinction, seek survival," national salvation), the heroic spirit of the people's army that fears no sacrifice, and the united strength of the military and the people greatly compensated for the inherent disadvantages in equipment and built a spiritual fortress that the invaders could not shake. From the late Qing "Lightning Gun" to the Anti-Japanese War "Old Yellow Ox," it encapsulates the spiritual epic of the entire nation 举国同心 (jǔ guó tóng xīn - "the whole nation with one heart," national unity) and relying on self-reliance at a time of national crisis.
Return to TopBy: 刘冬梅
General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized at the National Science and Technology Award Conference, the Conference of Academicians of the Two Academies, and the 11th National Congress of the China Association for Science and Technology that it is necessary to highlight the supply of scientific and technological innovation and the traction of industrial demand, promote integrated innovation of industry, academia, and research, and open up the channel for science and technology to accelerate its transformation into real productive forces. This important exposition reveals the dialectical law of the interaction between the supply of scientific and technological innovation and the traction of industrial demand, and points the direction for promoting the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation and accelerating the development of new quality productive forces (新质生产力). In recent years, the scale of transformation of scientific and technological achievements in China has continued to expand. To truly convert this scale advantage into a quality advantage of real productive forces, it is still necessary to make coordinated efforts in such links as smoothing the achievement chain, strengthening entities, improving incentives, and building the ecosystem.
Accelerate the transformation and application of existing technologies to industry, and smooth the path for science and technology to transform into real productive forces
The outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan makes clear arrangements for the construction of concept verification centers (概念验证中心) and pilot-scale verification platforms (中试验证平台). In 2024, 4,059 universities and research institutes in China transformed scientific and technological achievements through transfer, licensing, equity investment, technology development, consulting, and services, with a total contract value of 226.91 billion yuan, reflecting that the transformation potential of universities and research institutes is being continuously released. At the same time, it must be recognized that for existing technological achievements to move from the laboratory to scaled-up production, they must cross the key links of concept verification and pilot-scale verification, which is the key lever for avoiding transformation risks at the source.
Cross the starting point of transformation through the construction of concept verification centers. The first gateway of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements is the leap from scientific discovery to feasible technical principles and established commercial logic. Some research results remain stranded in the laboratory for a long time, with the root cause being the lack of a dedicated link for systematically verifying market prospects, business models, and technical feasibility. Concept verification centers, precisely through professional evaluation and feasibility verification, convert abstract research output into seed projects that can be decided upon. It is necessary to focus on key fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum science and technology, biomedicine, and new materials, and to make overall arrangements for the construction of concept verification centers targeting the bottlenecks and blockages of the innovation chain and industrial chain. At the same time, establish a connection mechanism between concept verification centers and pilot-scale verification platforms, forming a 环环相扣 (huán huán xiāng kòu - "linked ring by ring," closely interconnected) front-end chain of transformation.
Cross the "valley of death" of achievement transformation through the construction of pilot-scale verification platforms. Between prototype samples and scaled-up production, there exists an intermediate zone with large investment, high risk, and long cycles, which is the segment where achievement transformation failures are most concentrated. Achievements that go directly to industrialization without pilot-scale verification generally have a low success rate. Pilot-scale verification platforms are not only the physical carrier of engineering verification, but also the key hub for solidifying technical processes, shifting the cost curve downward, and front-loading market connection, determining the success or failure of the subsequent industrialization path. It is necessary to encourage enterprises to take the lead and universities and research institutes to participate in jointly building pilot-scale lines, and to promote the layout of a batch of industry-representative pilot-scale verification platforms in fields such as new materials and biomedicine. It is necessary to explore diversified support models such as "post-reward," "pilot-scale loans," and "appropriation-to-investment conversion" (拨转投), and establish rules for open sharing toward small, medium, and micro enterprises, so that more laboratory achievements can move to the workshop through the pilot-scale channel.
Connect the transformation pathway through the entire chain of science and technology finance. Every link of the achievement transformation chain corresponds to funding needs of different natures, different terms, and different risk preferences. Early-stage links have high risk and great uncertainty, mid-stage links have large investment and slow recovery, and late-stage links are close to marketization. The essence of the current construction of the science and technology financial service system lies in allocating financial resources according to the laws of achievement transformation, matching policy tools according to the nature of risks, and forming a financial support system covering the entire process from concept verification to industrialization. It is necessary to further implement the 15 policy measures in the "Several Policy Measures for Accelerating the Construction of a Science and Technology Financial System to Strongly Support High-Level Scientific and Technological Self-Reliance and Self-Improvement," and make good use of the science and technology innovation and technological transformation relending quota expanded from 500 billion yuan to 1.2 trillion yuan. It is necessary to give play to the guiding role of the National Venture Capital Guidance Fund in investing early, investing small, investing long-term, and investing in hard technology, cultivate and strengthen patient capital, improve the "appropriation-insurance-loan-investment" (拨保贷投) coordinated support system, and let the "living water" of finance precisely drip-irrigate along the achievement transformation chain.
Improve the ability to pose questions, and strengthen the principal position of enterprises in scientific and technological innovation
The report of the 20th CPC National Congress emphasizes strengthening the principal position of enterprises in scientific and technological innovation, giving play to the leading and supporting role of key science and technology-based enterprises, and creating a favorable environment conducive to the growth of science and technology-based small, medium, and micro enterprises. Its core lies in improving enterprises' ability to pose questions, so that the real problems of industry become the main battlefield of national scientific and technological research.
Consolidate the foundation of innovation entities with the advantage of enterprise R&D investment. In 2025, the annual expenditure on research and experimental development (R&D) reached 3,926.2 billion yuan, with a ratio to GDP of 2.80%, for the first time exceeding the average level of OECD countries, and enterprises accounted for more than 77% of R&D expenditure. This shows that the pattern of Chinese enterprises as the main force of R&D investment is basically stable, and the trend of innovation resources gathering toward enterprises continues to strengthen. To consolidate and expand the advantage of enterprise R&D investment, the key lies in converting the advantage of investment scale into the advantage of output efficiency. It is necessary to improve the R&D reserve fund system, standardize the formation, use, and management of R&D reserve funds, and guide leading science and technology enterprises to invest reserve funds primarily in forward-looking and basic research directions.
Improve enterprises' ability to pose questions through basic research investment. The strength of enterprises' ability to pose questions fundamentally depends on the level of basic research investment. Only by deeply cultivating the basic frontier can enterprises pose real questions with original value that lead the future of industry. In 2025, China's basic research expenditure reached 277.8 billion yuan, with the proportion of R&D expenditure rising to 7.08%, a record high, but there is still a considerable gap compared with developed countries. Central enterprises, through establishing joint funds, taking the lead in building national key laboratories, and other means, deeply participate in the construction of the national basic research system. In 2025, the basic research investment of central enterprises exceeded 100 billion yuan for the first time. It is necessary to take central enterprises and state-owned enterprises as the lead, drive more leading science and technology enterprises to treat basic research as strategic investment, expand the proportion of entrepreneur-expert participation in the compilation of guidelines for the national key R&D program, and let industrial demand obtain a front-loaded voice in the formulation of national science and technology strategy.
Systematically improve enterprises' ability to pose questions, answer questions, and grade papers through institutional construction. Enterprises bear the triple role of question-poser, answerer, and grader, running through the entire process of scientific and technological innovation, and are the concrete expression of enterprises' principal position in innovation. To establish and implement this role positioning, the key lies in using institutionalized arrangements to carry enterprises' demand-side voice through all links of project establishment, organization, and evaluation of scientific and technological research. It is necessary to support leading science and technology enterprises in taking the lead in undertaking national major science and technology projects and key R&D programs, lay out systematic, mission-oriented innovation consortia in key fields such as integrated circuits and machine tools, and clarify the intellectual property ownership and benefit distribution mechanisms of innovation consortia. Support enterprises in leading the project establishment and acceptance of application-oriented science and technology projects, evaluate scientific and technological achievements with market demand and industrial value as the core, simultaneously build a two-way collaborative relationship between schools and enterprises, and let the industrial demand side and the scientific and technological supply side form a stable docking channel.
Promote the reform of empowerment of job-related scientific and technological achievements (职务科技成果) and separate asset management, and continuously improve incentive mechanisms
The "Decision" of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee clearly arranges to deepen the reform of empowerment of job-related scientific and technological achievements, establish a separate asset management system for job-related scientific and technological achievements, and allow scientific and technical personnel greater autonomy in the distribution of income from the transformation of scientific and technological achievements. Job-related scientific and technological achievements have such special characteristics as strong timeliness, rapid value changes, and limited transformation windows; if not transformed in time, their value will shrink substantially. The essence of empowerment reform and separate management is to liberate scientific and technological achievements from the rigid framework of traditional state-owned asset management, and endow researchers with stable expectations and full autonomy.
Return to the factor attribute of scientific and technological achievements through separate management. Job-related scientific and technological achievements are different from general state-owned assets; their value realization is highly dependent on actual transformation actions and market-oriented operation mechanisms. There is a structural tension between some requirements of traditional state-owned asset management and the timeliness requirements of achievement transformation. The institutional value of separate management lies precisely in establishing dedicated management rules for scientific and technological achievements, letting asset management return to the standard of innovation factor flow, and letting research institutions dare to let go and let achievements go to market. It is necessary to improve the dedicated rules for the confirmation, use, and disposal of scientific and technological achievement assets, and form evaluation, assessment, and supervision mechanisms that conform to the laws of innovation. It is necessary to formulate supporting operational guidelines in such links as asset evaluation, property rights registration, and disposal approval, so that separate management is transformed from a principled deployment into an operable and assessable institutional arrangement.
Solve the problems of not daring to transform and not willing to transform through empowerment reform. The core effectiveness of the empowerment reform pilot lies in providing researchers with stable expectations through clear empowerment of ownership or long-term use rights, fundamentally resolving the wait-and-see mentality caused by ambiguous property rights attribution and uncertain income expectations. It is necessary to promote diversified empowerment models, gradually expand the coverage of empowerment reform, and clarify exemption circumstances and negative lists. Formulate operational guidelines for due diligence exemption in empowerment reform, detail such specific matters as the definition of diligent performance of duties, exemption circumstances, and determination procedures, and let research institutions and researchers have clear expectations and boundaries. Implement the method of confirming rights first and then transforming, support the split confirmation of rights between the unit owning the achievement and the completers, and let researchers obtain reasonable returns matching their contributions in achievement transformation.
Solve the problem of not knowing how to transform through professional services. What empowerment reform activates is property rights incentives, but whether property rights incentives can truly land depends on the professional intermediary capacity for achievements to go to market. Researchers are good at innovation, but not necessarily good at market-oriented operation; a scientific and technological achievement possessing technical value does not mean it naturally possesses commercial value. The professional service system connecting the supply and demand ends of achievements is the key support for realizing the effectiveness of empowerment reform, and is also the relatively lagging link in the current reform process. It is necessary to expand the team of high-level technology managers, improve institutional norms such as professional qualifications and training certification, and establish a professional title sequence for technology managers and matching salary incentive arrangements. Technology managers are an important bond connecting the supply and demand ends of achievements and promoting achievement transformation; the expansion of the team concerns whether empowered achievements can truly land and take effect. It is necessary to simultaneously implement the use-first-pay-later model, encourage universities and research institutes to license scientific and technological achievements to small, medium, and micro enterprises on a use-first-pay-later basis, and explore diversified payment methods such as zero-threshold plus milestone payments.
Continuously improve the evaluation system, and support collaborative innovation among universities, research institutes, and enterprises
The evaluation system is the key to stimulating collaborative innovation; wherever the evaluation "baton" points, talent and resources flow; evaluation reform is the key lever for prying open the integrated reform of education, science and technology, and talent. Building a collaborative innovation ecosystem with evaluation reform as the traction is the inherent requirement for promoting the coordinated linkage of various innovation entities.
Reshape the evaluation orientation with "breaking the four onlys" (破四唯) and "establishing new standards." The fundamental task of evaluation reform is to break the old inertia of only papers, only titles, only degrees, and only awards, and establish new standards oriented by quality, contribution, and performance. Breaking and establishing are two sides of one body; what is broken is simple quantification and mechanical benchmarking, what is established is classification by type and diversified value. At present, scientific and technological evaluation reform has achieved remarkable results in the construction of the policy framework, but continuous efforts are still needed in the implementation of institutions and the construction of deep-level mechanisms. It is necessary to resolutely "break the four onlys," and incorporate transformation effectiveness into the professional title review, performance assessment, and discipline evaluation of application-research-oriented innovation entities. It is necessary to improve the implementation rules for classified evaluation: basic research results are mainly evaluated by peer review, applied research results are mainly evaluated by industry users and society, and technology development and industrialization results are mainly evaluated by third-party market evaluation. Let different types of achievements all find matching evaluation yardsticks.
Manifest the diversified value of scientific and technological achievements through classified evaluation. The value of scientific and technological achievements is diversified and differentiated; the "one-size-fits-all" evaluation method is neither conducive to the long-term accumulation of basic research nor conducive to the industrial docking of applied research. The deep significance of classified evaluation lies in acknowledging that scientific and technological achievements have different value forms and realization paths, guiding differentiated innovation behavior with differentiated evaluation logic, letting basic research be willing to sit on the cold bench and applied research bravely charge into the main battlefield. It is necessary to implement the framework of scientific, technological, economic, social, and cultural value in specific scenarios such as university evaluation, research institute assessment, and science and technology project acceptance, and increase the indicator weight of serving major national strategies and solving key core technologies in university evaluation. It is necessary to establish a classified evaluation mechanism for universities, encourage different tracks to develop characteristics and quality, and avoid homogeneous competition and resource misallocation.
Build a collaborative ecosystem through two-way flow of talent. The deep-seated obstacles to collaborative innovation often lie not in the lack of willingness, but in institutional and mechanism barriers. Talent flow between universities, research institutes, and enterprises involves complex matters such as professional title connection, social security transfer, achievement attribution, and salary attribution, affecting supporting reforms of multiple departments. Only by breaking unit boundaries and establishing mutual recognition and sharing mechanisms can talent flow smoothly among different entities, and collaborative innovation move from stage-based cooperation to a long-term ecosystem. It is necessary to implement the "science and technology deputy general manager" (科技副总) system, select researchers from universities and research institutes to serve as enterprise science and technology deputy general managers, and help enterprises condense and solve key technical problems. It is necessary to implement the "industry professor" (产业教授) system, select high-level enterprise talent to serve as university industry professors, and participate in talent cultivation, discipline construction, and scientific research. It is necessary to formulate the assessment and recognition standards and position appointment rules for "industry professors" and "science and technology deputy general managers," and establish supporting mechanisms for mutual recognition of evaluation and benefit sharing. Let universities truly turn as the hub of the integrated development of education, science and technology, and talent, and let the needs of enterprises as innovation entities truly transmit to universities and research institutes.
The above four aspects are interconnected and mutually supportive. Accelerating the transformation of existing technologies to industry smooths the achievement chain; improving enterprises' ability to pose questions strengthens innovation entities; promoting the empowerment of job-related scientific and technological achievements activates property rights incentives; improving the evaluation system builds a collaborative ecosystem. The four together point to the fundamental goal of deep integration of scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation, providing solid institutional support for developing new quality productive forces and building a modern industrial system. By coordinating the four dimensions of achievements, entities, momentum, and ecosystem, and advancing institutional and mechanism reform with systematic thinking, the channel for science and technology to accelerate transformation into real productive forces will continue to be smooth, and the momentum for the development of new quality productive forces will continue to be abundant.
(The author is the Party Secretary of the Chinese Academy of Science and Technology for Development (中国科学技术发展战略研究院).)
Return to TopServing the construction of the new development pattern, port cities bear a special mission and have great potential for achievement (大有可为 (dà yǒu kě wéi - "there is much that can be done," to have great potential for achievement)). Recently, Ningbo, Zhejiang held a special expert symposium, bringing together experts and scholars from high-end think tanks, focusing on the core proposition of building a "dual circulation" (双循环) strategic hub, conducting in-depth discussions and building consensus around key areas such as the deep integration of "port, industry, city, culture, and people" (港产城文人), high-level institutional opening up, the leap in global hub capacity, and the construction of new industrialization, systematically exploring the distinctive paths and practical paradigms for port cities to empower the new development pattern. The core viewpoints of this symposium and Ningbo's innovative practical achievements are now summarized and presented.
In March 2020, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized during his inspection of the Chuanshan Port Area of Ningbo-Zhoushan Port: "Ningbo-Zhoushan Port holds an important position in national strategies such as the joint construction of the 'Belt and Road,' the development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, and the integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta; it is a 'hard-core' force. We must adhere to first-class standards, build and manage the port well, strive to create a world-class strong port, and make greater contributions to national development." Coordinating the promotion of the "three major tasks" of platform capacity enhancement, hub construction and strengthening, and model innovation, and empowering the construction of the "dual circulation" strategic hub through the multi-dimensional integration of "port, industry, city, culture, and people," is the core path for the port city of Ningbo to serve the national strategy and achieve high-quality development.
To deepen theoretical exploration, Ningbo recently held a special expert symposium on "Building a 'Dual Circulation' Strategic Hub, Demonstrating Greater Achievement in Serving and Integrating into the New Development Pattern." Experts and scholars from high-end think tanks and practical departments, including the Central Party School (National Academy of Governance), the Development Research Center of the State Council, and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences, conducted in-depth discussions on topics such as the integration of "port, industry, city, culture, and people," institutional opening up, hub capacity enhancement, and new industrialization. The experts attending the symposium held that: large coastal ports must break free from the single logistics port mindset; only by promoting the integrated development of port, industry, city, culture, and people can they achieve the leap from cargo hub to global resource allocation hub.
Over the years, Ningbo has continuously transformed port advantages into hub advantages, manufacturing advantages into industrial advantages, and opening-up advantages into institutional advantages, forming a batch of practical achievements in the process of serving the construction of the new development pattern.
In 2025, the cargo throughput of Ningbo-Zhoushan Port reached 1.432 billion tons, ranking first globally in cargo throughput for 17 consecutive years; container throughput exceeded 43.87 million TEUs, firmly ranking third globally; the Xinhua-Baltic International Shipping Centre Development Index ranked sixth globally, achieving a "five-level leap" in six years. The Ningbo Area of the Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone (浙江自贸试验区宁波片区) has cumulatively launched 295 institutional innovation measures. In the first half of 2026, the city's total import and export volume reached 771.3 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 6.9%, of which the combined export of "new three items" (新三样) products reached 34.9 billion yuan, an increase of 134.5%. With the multi-dimensional integration of "port, industry, city, culture, and people" as the main line, Ningbo is accelerating its transformation from a large logistics port to a value hub, from a large manufacturing city to a strong intelligent manufacturing city, and from a major opening-up city to a highland of institutional opening up, laying a solid practical foundation for building a national-level "dual circulation" strategic hub.
Highlighting strong port foundation building, weaving a dense "dual circulation" global hub network system
A hub is an important node or platform with functions of connection, aggregation, organization, and allocation, playing an important role in supporting economic operation and smoothing economic circulation. Building a national-level hub has significant and far-reaching implications for expanding new space for high-quality development and enhancing the level of high-level opening up. As a key node of the comprehensive transportation system and an important gateway for opening up, the port undertakes multiple functions in constructing the new development pattern. Relying on its core port advantages, Ningbo continues to enhance its global hub capacity, comprehensively strengthen its overall competitiveness, and steadily advance toward the goal of becoming an internationally top-tier modern major port and a hub for "dispatching global resources."
Forging the hard-core force of a world-class strong port. Adhere to first-class standards in building a world-class strong port, comprehensively enhance connection capacity, transit and aggregation capacity, operation and organization capacity, resource allocation capacity, innovation capacity, value-added capacity, and security assurance capacity. Improve the port collection and distribution system, implement the "Ningbo-Zhoushan Port Master Plan (2035)," promote the integrated development of port areas such as Meishan (梅山) and Liuheng (六横), and improve the "two trunks, three verticals, four horizontals" waterway system. The 300,000-ton-class expansion project of the Tiaozhoumen Waterway (条帚门) has been put into trial navigation, increasing the passage capacity for ultra-large vessels by more than 50%. Intensify sea-rail intermodal routes; in 2025, sea-rail intermodal business volume exceeded 2 million TEUs for the first time, with more than 110 routes radiating to 69 cities in 16 provinces and 40 inland dry ports deployed. The world's first China-Europe Arctic container express route was opened, becoming the fastest direct route from the Yangtze River Delta to Europe. At present, the port has 309 container routes, of which 257 are international routes, and the global shipping network continues to be densified.
Optimizing the global allocation of bulk commodity resources. Leverage the unique advantages of the port, location, and resources and the pioneering role of the pilot free trade zone, strengthen the storage, transit, and aggregation functions of bulk commodities, enhance resource aggregation and economic radiation capacity, build a bulk commodity circulation organization center, and create a trading, pricing, and decision-making center. Deepen the whole-chain reform of bulk commodities, focusing on strategic materials such as oil, gas, and ores, promote the integrated upgrading of "storage, transportation, trade, industry, services, and data," and build a national-level strategic reserve base. Strengthen the Zhejiang International Bulk Commodity Trading Center, and explore innovative businesses such as cross-border RMB settlement and bonded futures delivery. Pilot cross-border RMB settlement for iron ore, and promote the sustained growth of bonded futures delivery business volume. Expand the scale of bonded bunker fuel refueling, and improve supporting services for trade, maritime affairs, and finance. The port and shipping logistics data trading center has been established and operational, cultivating "verifiable global legal entity identifier" issuing institutions in the bulk commodity field, implementing "blockchain + digital warehouse receipt" trust projects, with 41 bulk commodity trading leading enterprises reaching the ten-billion-yuan level, Meishan International Cold Chain annual trade volume exceeding 10 billion yuan, and substantial breakthroughs achieved in the construction of the national bulk commodity resource allocation hub.
Vigorously developing high-end shipping service industries. Focus on high-end service industries such as shipping logistics, port and shipping digital services, and maritime professional supporting services, continuously deepen institutional integration innovation in the port and shipping service field, and promote the iterative upgrading of port and shipping services toward high-end, international, and digital directions. High-end shipping service formats such as shipping finance and ship management are accelerating their aggregation; innovative products such as "Yonghang Xinrong" shipping finance and marine industry finance have been successively released; professional platforms such as the Ningbo Foreign-Related Legal Services Cluster and the CIETAC Ningbo Hearing Center have been built and put into operation. Ningbo Beilun (北仑) has proactively sought the delegation of provincial-level shipping management authority and successfully introduced a number of leading industry institutions. Simultaneously, green and low-carbon shipping industries are being laid out, with ship biofuel refueling business being the first to land in East China, the province's first ship green methanol refueling project landing, and a diversified ship clean energy refueling supply system being constructed. Relying on the "one-network smart connection" port full-process digital service system, the "rail-sea express + international ocean express" multimodal transport innovative logistics model, and other sea-rail intermodal demonstration reforms, the overall port operation efficiency and comprehensive service capacity are continuously improved, promoting the deep transformation of port functions from a single "cargo transfer station" to a "global supply chain integrated operation node."
Promoting Shanghai-Ningbo cooperation to go deeper and more practical. Actively serve and integrate into Shanghai's "five centers" construction, deepen Shanghai-Ningbo cooperation, and promote the high-quality integrated development of the Yangtze River Delta. Leverage the leading and driving role of Shanghai International Shipping Center, promote the coordinated development of Shanghai Port and Ningbo-Zhoushan Port, and build a world-class port cluster. Strengthen the coordinated linkage between Shanghai Lingang New Area and the Ningbo Area of the Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone, strengthen mutual learning of pioneering experiences in institutional opening up, and carry out deeper institutional innovation in areas such as cross-border data, offshore finance, and offshore trade. Coordinately promote the construction of the bulk commodity resource allocation hub and enhance high-end shipping service capacity. Accelerate the construction of the Ningbo Qianwan (前湾) Shanghai-Zhejiang Cooperation Development Zone, advance the construction of the Ningbo-Zhoushan Railway and the Nantong-Suzhou-Jiaxing-Ningbo High-Speed Railway, and build a "1-hour traffic circle" between Shanghai and Ningbo and within the province. Make every effort to promote major projects such as the Shanghai-Ningbo cross-sea passage to achieve breakthrough progress, and join hands with Pudong New Area to build an industrial innovation belt along the East China Sea.
Strengthening industry-innovation integration, building a highland for cultivating new quality productive forces (新质生产力)
Scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation are the basic paths for developing new quality productive forces. Ningbo is anchored on four major construction goals: a city-wide high-level innovative city, a global advanced manufacturing highland, an "AI + manufacturing" full-scenario open innovation highland, and a city of manufacturing single champions, solidly promoting the deep integration of scientific and technological innovation and industrial innovation, and striving to build a modern industrial system that is independent and controllable, safe and reliable, and highly competitive.
Promoting the "chain-level leap" of industrial clusters. Focus on building world-class green petrochemical and new energy vehicle and parts clusters, scale up the development of emerging industries such as integrated circuits, aerospace, and life and health, and prospectively lay out future industries such as embodied intelligence, frontier new materials, and new energy. Focus on strengthening key industrial chains such as intelligent robots, machine tools, and intelligent sensing, and deepen the pilot of integrated development of advanced manufacturing and modern service industries. The city has 14 national-level industrial clusters, rare earth magnetic material output accounts for 40% of the national total, and it gathers more than 20% of the country's related enterprises. From being approved as a "Made in China 2025" pilot demonstration city in 2016 to being selected as one of the first batch of cities to create national new industrialization demonstration zones in 2026, Ningbo is accelerating its march from a large manufacturing city to a strong intelligent manufacturing city.
Consolidating the "wild goose formation support" of the enterprise echelon. Focus on cultivating manufacturing headquarters enterprises, industry-leading enterprises, and high-growth technology-based enterprises, regularly carry out cultivation actions for single champion enterprises and specialized, refined, distinctive, and innovative (SRDI) enterprises, promote the "micro growth, small upgrading, large expansion, strong transformation" of enterprises, and precisely incubate "gazelle stars" and unicorn enterprises. The city has cultivated 119 national-level manufacturing single champion enterprises, ranking first among cities nationwide for 8 consecutive years; has 511 national-level SRDI "little giant" enterprises, and more than 150 listed enterprises at home and abroad. Ningbo's private enterprises account for more than 90% of manufacturing entities, and private enterprises have become the main force of intelligent manufacturing. Ningbo adheres to and implements the "two unswerving commitments" (两个毫不动摇), promotes the high-quality development of the private economy, and consolidates the domestic demand foundation. Build a "1+N" model to develop the "sweet potato economy" (地瓜经济), explore models of jointly building industrial parks around industrial chains, jointly building logistics parks around supply chains, and jointly building service parks around service chains, and provide high-quality services for private enterprises to expand development space in both domestic and international markets.
Activating the "source empowerment" of scientific and technological innovation. Build a key support point of the Shanghai (Yangtze River Delta) International Science and Technology Innovation Center to high standards, and proactively undertake Shanghai's industrial spillover and innovation resources. Relying on important platforms such as the Yongjiang Science and Innovation Zone (甬江科创区), build various industrial technology research institutes to high standards, improve public service systems such as concept verification, inspection and testing, and pilot-scale maturation, and vigorously promote the large-scale implementation of new technologies, new products, and new scenarios. Deeply implement the "AI +" action, accelerate the construction of a national AI application pilot base and a manufacturing digital transformation promotion center. The city has 270 core AI enterprises, of which 14 are provincial-level AI application benchmark enterprises, ranking first in the province. Ningbo has been ranked among the global top 100 innovation clusters, and its innovation source capacity continues to strengthen.
Building the "intellectual foundation" of talent cultivation and attraction. Explore the organized promotion of the school (institute)-enterprise mutual appointment model, and promote "industry professors" and "technology deputy general managers" to go down to enterprises. Iteratively upgrade the Yongjiang talent project, deeply implement the "1510" talent-strengthening city system construction project. The city has 219,000 young scientific and technological talents under the age of 40, accounting for 75% of the total number of scientific researchers, and a young scientific and technological talent echelon deeply engaged in innovation and entrepreneurship, basic research, and other fields is growing and strengthening. Jointly carry out talent recruitment cooperation with Shanghai, share overseas talent recruitment channels, and attract and gather global high-level scientific and technological innovation talents. Through strong industrial agglomeration effects and an open innovation ecosystem, continuously attract all kinds of talents to gather in Ningbo, providing solid talent support and intellectual support for the high-quality development of manufacturing.
Expanding institutional opening up, accelerating the integrated development of "port, industry, city, culture, and people"
Steadily expanding institutional opening up is conducive both to promoting better connectivity between the domestic and international markets, using the domestic circulation to attract global resource factors, and to supporting the overseas layout of Chinese enterprises, enhancing China's influence in the global industrial chain, supply chain, and innovation chain. With the Ningbo Area of the Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone as the core carrier, Ningbo continues to expand institutional opening up, promote the deep integration of "port, industry, city, culture, and people," and explore new paths for high-quality development.
Strengthening institutional innovation in the pilot free trade zone. Focus on amplifying the superimposed advantages of the Ningbo Area of the Zhejiang Pilot Free Trade Zone, fully activate the trinity composite function of "free trade zone + comprehensive bonded zone + world-class seaport," and institutional innovation achievements continue to emerge, among which the "integrated innovation of cross-border trade and investment facilitation" case was selected into the fifth batch of "best practice cases" of national pilot free trade zones. Focus on the core track of bulk commodity trade, innovatively launch the underground cavern layered utilization and rights confirmation mechanism, unblock the whole-chain bottlenecks of storage rights confirmation and pledge financing for bulk commodities such as petrochemicals and minerals, and accumulate useful experience for the standardized and capitalized operation of national bulk commodity storage and logistics. Deeply cultivate the China-CEEC Economic and Trade Cooperation Demonstration Zone, continuously enhance the platform capacity of the demonstration zone, take the lead in piloting the new model of negative list management for cross-border service trade, and broaden the two-way opening channels for CEEC goods and services. Deepen Ningbo-Yiwu coordinated development, link up with Yiwu's "world supermarket" commercial and trade resources, build a dual-hub coordinated linkage system of "seaport hub + inland commercial and trade market," innovatively form the integrated and efficient circulation model of "Ningbo customs declaration, Yiwu distribution" for bulk commodities, and construct an integrated logistics and customs clearance channel between coastal ports and inland commercial and trade markets.
Promoting smooth and convenient cross-border trade. Promote customs clearance models such as "two-step declaration" and "direct pick-up alongside the ship," implementing "first summary declaration and pickup, then supplementary information." Continuously optimize key business processes such as CEEC goods import and cross-border e-commerce trade, and improve the port business environment. Align with international high-standard economic and trade rules, using the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), and the Digital Economy Partnership Agreement (DEPA) as benchmarks, and promote institutional alignment according to "item-scenario-pilot-evaluation-promotion." Deepen the construction of smart ports, upgrade the facilitation services of the international trade "single window," promote high-level opening-up pilots for cross-border trade and investment, and enhance the cross-border management service level of ports, finance, and commercial registration. Simultaneously implement pilots such as the "domestic and foreign currency integrated capital pool" and "domestic and foreign currency integrated bank settlement account," improving capital coordination and multi-currency settlement efficiency.
Promoting the integrated development of domestic and foreign trade. Promote institutional and model innovation, advance institutional and mechanism reform step by step, continuously remove institutional obstacles facing the integrated development of domestic and foreign trade, and optimize the environment for the integrated development of domestic and foreign trade. Support integrated domestic and foreign trade operations, innovate integrated domestic and foreign trade development models, and strengthen professional talent cultivation and training for domestic and foreign trade integration. Solidly promote the implementation of the "export-to-domestic sales" policy, helping foreign trade enterprises with their domestic layout. Implement special policies for domestic and foreign trade integration, formulate subsidy policies such as booth fee subsidies for the "China Tour of Excellent Foreign Trade Products" and premium subsidies for enterprises purchasing domestic trade credit insurance, helping enterprises reduce costs and increase efficiency. Promote the integration and upgrading of the production end, stimulate the vitality of market entities, and build an integrated promotion system of standard rules, manufacturing models, and scientific and technological innovation. Replicate and promote reform experiences such as the offshore trade stamp duty preferential policy, and develop new trade formats such as international transit, offshore resale trade, bonded maintenance, and remanufacturing.
Deepening the integration and empowerment of "port, industry, city, culture, and people." Adhere to embracing the ocean and seeking strength from the sea, continuously promote the linked empowerment of "port, industry, city, culture, and people," rely on the port hub to make good use of both domestic and international markets and resources, and cultivate and strengthen new economic growth poles. Build the foundation with a strong port, optimize the spatial planning of port areas and urban areas, and achieve the coordinated progress of efficient port operation and livable urban development. Empower with industry, rely on port area resources to deepen inter-district industrial division of labor and scientific and technological innovation cooperation, forming a virtuous cycle of "port traffic diversion, industry landing, economic quality improvement." Carry with the city, coordinate urban spatial planning and coastal resource development, and create a livable, business-friendly, industry-city symbiotic coastal urban space. Nourish the soul with culture, deeply explore Ningbo's characteristic cultural resources such as Maritime Silk Road culture and Wang Yangming culture, and actively inherit the thousand-year maritime port civilization. Promote the deep integration of culture, commerce, tourism, and sports, create distinctive cultural tourism blocks and marine cultural IPs, and comprehensively enhance the city's recognition, influence, and soft power. Gather momentum with people, continuously improve the full-chain support for young talents in housing, employment, and entrepreneurship, rely on industrial communities and rural service positions to serve the people well, fully mobilize the strength of entrepreneurs, industrial workers, young makers, and other groups, and activate the endogenous driving force of urban development through the comprehensive development of people.
Solidly promoting common prosperity. Ningbo firmly grasps the core task of high-quality development and building a common prosperity demonstration zone, relies on the port to gather port-adjacent manufacturing, logistics, and other industrial clusters, and creates a large number of employment opportunities. The port economy provides strong support for people's livelihood security, promoting the upgrading of public services such as education, medical care, and elderly care. Innovate the "three-zone linkage" model of "industrial parks, industrial communities, and rural areas," promote the sinking of production factors, order demand, and technical services to the countryside, and achieve a win-win situation of residents' "employment at the doorstep" and enterprise recruitment. In 2025, the income ratio between urban and rural residents in Ningbo narrowed to 1.60, better than the provincial average, achieving 22 consecutive years of continuous narrowing.
Constructing the new development pattern is a strategic choice to keep pace with the times in improving the level of China's economic development, and also a strategic choice to shape new advantages in China's international economic cooperation and competition. The port is a basic and hub-type facility and an important support for economic development. Ningbo's building of a "dual circulation" strategic hub is both a political responsibility to serve the national strategy and the only way to achieve its own high-quality development. Facing the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, Ningbo will continue to forge the hard-core force of the port, accelerate the construction of a national new industrialization demonstration zone, deepen the pioneering and piloting of institutional opening up, promote the deep integration of "port, industry, city, culture, and people," continuously enhance the capacity for global resource allocation, scientific and technological innovation source capacity, high-end industry leadership capacity, and open hub gateway capacity, strive to build a strategic hub serving the construction of the new development pattern, and contribute more Ningbo strength to Chinese-style modernization.
(Ningbo University Base of the Zhejiang Provincial Research Center for Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era)
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