Sharper focus on tech innovation and science tops China's economic priorities

Country tapping disruptive, cutting-edge tech’ to become self-reliant superpower

- Lim Min Zhang

China plans to develop its high-tech industries in 2024 to accelerate its transition to becoming a self-reliant superpower, in the face of technology curbs imposed by the United States and Europe.

This will likely come in the form of funding research and development, easing access to capital, and cultivating innovative and high-potential small companies in fields including aerospace, renewable energy and semiconductors.

Using "disruptive and cutting-edge technologies" to create new industries such as artificial intelligence, bio-manufacturing and the digital economy is China's top economic priority for 2024.

This was set out in the Dec 12 official statement following the Central Economic Work Conference (CEWC), Beijing's annual meeting that outlines the country's economic agenda for the upcoming year.

In contrast, boosting domestic demand was top of the list at the 2022 December conference, followed by "accelerating the construction of a modern industrial system".

The shifting priorities come after a year of intensifying strategic competition between the US and China, especially in cutting-edge technology, with each side taking tit-for-tat measures.

The US announced export controls on advanced computer chips and related equipment in October 2022 that targeted China, which protested against the move.

In August 2023, China tightened exports of gallium and E germanium, materials used to produce chips. The next month, tech giant Huawei unveiled a flagship smartphone that boasted an advanced, domestically-produced chip.

Ties between China and the US nosedived after then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan in 2022.