Report shows R&D spending on the rise

China's R&D spending in 2022 exceeded 3 trillion yuan ($439 billion) for the first time, according to a report released recently by Dalian University of Technology.

The report said R&D spending reached 3.08 trillion yuan, an increase of 10.4 percent over the previous year. The growth rate has exceeded 10 percent for seven consecutive years.

China's R&D spending in 2020 was 2.44 trillion yuan, the report said, ranking second in the world, behind the United States. Its R&D intensity — total national R&D outlay as a percent of GDP — was 2.4 percent, ranking fourth in the world, behind the US, Japan and Germany.

The report added a topic, saying that basic research spending in China topped 195 billion yuan. China's basic research was more than 6 percent of total national R&D outlay in 2019, still far behind that of major developed countries.

According to the report, the crucial task of China's R&D spending is not an increase in scale but the optimization of structure. There are large differences in allocation across various regions.

It said that the eastern region accounted for more than 60 percent of the country's total R&D spending. The central and western regions accounted for about 15 percent, while the northeastern region accounted for 4 percent in recent years.