Speaking on the “Ministerial Channel,” set up for better communication at the National People’s Congress, Chinese Science Minister Wang Zhigang elaborated the importance of basic scientific research. He said that research in basic fields often has unclear paths, uncertain methods, and a relatively high failure rate. “For such research work, we must work hard to promote the formation of a scientific research environment that tolerates failure and encourages ‘sitting on the bench.’ We must provide better targeted and adaptive arrangements for the support methods and research ecology of scientific researchers engaged in basic research.” In terms of evaluation, the principle of classification evaluation should be reflected, he said. There are commonalities between the evaluation of basic research and the evaluation of applied engineering, but at the same time there must be differences. “Basic research emphasizes 10 years of hard work, and sits firmly on the bench,” he underlined.
Wang Zhigang said that the Ministry of Science and Technology will implement major strategic deployments of the Party Central Committee on technological innovation, especially in basic research. The first is to strengthen curiosity-driven, frontier-oriented exploratory basic research; the second is to strengthen the national strategic goal-driven, strategically oriented systematic basic research; the third is to strengthen market-driven applied basic research. In this way, basic research is systematically arranged and promoted, and basic research is truly integrated with national strategies and national development goals, and it plays an irreplaceable basic, strategic, and source-supporting and leading role.
