Yantai sees strong results in scientific innovation

Yantai, a coastal city in East China's Shandong province, made remarkable progress in scientific and technological innovation during its 13th Five-Year Plan period (2016-20).

The local government provided strong support for scientific and technological innovation over the past five years, and the city's annual expenditures on R&D increased from 14.9 billion yuan ($2.28 billion) to 17 billion yuan.

The output value of high-tech industries accounted for 52.07 percent of industries above designated size, up nearly 10 percentage points from 2015.

The figures are a testament to the city's efforts to step up scientific and technological innovation.

The city has launched more than 1,000 innovation projects involving high-end equipment manufacturing, new materials, next-generation information technology, healthcare, and modern agriculture.

For example, Blue Whale 1 and Blue Whale 2, ultra-deep-water drilling rigs developed by Yantai CIMC Raffles, helped China become the first country to explore gas hydrates.

In addition, the Long March 11 carrier rocket was assembled and tested in Haiyang, a county-level city in Yantai. Haiyang acts as a service port for rocket launches and has shown strong potential in the aerospace industry.

Advanced technologies such as big data, cloud computing, and AI have been widely used in the fight against the COVID-19 in Yantai, offering things like fever screening systems and disinfection robots.

The city's high-tech industries have developed rapidly as well. The number of high-tech enterprises in Yantai has increased from 301 in 2015 to 823 in 2019 and is expected to exceed 1,000 by the end of the year.