China Boosts Public Science Education Efforts Amid Tech Rivalry With US

Decades-old drive to educate grassroots on scientific issues set to gain from revised law

- Lim Min Zhang

The work of educating China's grassroots on scientific issues and gaining their support is set to receive a boost following a major revision to the country's Science and Technology Popularisation Law.

Activities such as museum exhibitions and talks by leading Chinese scientists are part of a decades-old national effort known as science popularisation, which has become more important to China of late as it seeks to become a technology powerhouse by 2035.

Professor Zhang Lijie, deputy director of the China Research Institute for Science Popularisation, noted that the new law, among other things, specifies how to provide better incentives for workers in this field, so as to encourage more talented people to devote themselves to the cause.

"It also stipulates September each year to be the National Science Popularisation Month, which provides a more solid guarantee for regular, social science popularisation activities for the public," he said of the law passed in December.

On the surface, talent attraction appears to be a key reason behind the science popularisation effort, to draw more bright young minds to fields such as artificial intelligence (AI), information technology and biomedicine.

But it is also about gaining public support for scientific and technological initiatives whose benefits may not be apparent to the man in the street, especially as they are not expected to bear fruit immediately.

A basic level of scientific literacy has also become more important as China moves quickly in areas ranging from the use of nuclear energy to genetic modification.