U.S. Information Technology Office

Four Ministries Jointly Issue the Guidance Catalogue of Indigenous Innovation on Major Technology Equipment

On December 25, 2009, four ministries, namely the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST), Ministry of Finance (MOF), and State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC), jointly issued the circular of “Guidance Catalogue of Indigenous Innovation on Major Technology Equipment (重大技术装备自主创新指导目录)”. The circular identifies 18 areas and 240 equipment products, which shall be privileged in relevant technology and product development plans, receive relevant funding support, enjoy policy support like government procurement, and enjoy preferential treatment when applying for listing in the “Indigenous Innovation Products Catalogue”.

In detail, the 18 areas include:
1. Clean energy & high efficiency electricity-generating equipment; 2. Super or extra-high voltage electric transmission and suite of transformation equipment; 3. Large-scale petroleum and petrochemical equipment; 4. Suite of Large-scale coal chemical equipment; 5. Suite of Large-scale high-accuracy metallurgy equipment;
6. Large-scale coal and glory-hole equipment; 7. Transportation equipment; 8. Large-scale equipment used in environmental protection and recourse comprehensive utilization; 9. Large-scale construction machinery;
10. New-type textile machinery; 11. New-type & large-horsepower agricultural equipment; 12. Electronic/biology/medical high technical equipment; 13. High technical equipment used in shipping and ocean engineering; 14. High-range numerically controlled machine tools; 15. Airplanes for civilian use; 16. High-range printing machinery; 17. Key fundamental components and heavy castings and forgings; 18. Equipment specifically used in airport and port machinery.

There are four standards to evaluate the candidate products under the Catalogue: 1. the product is urgently needed by key projects and national economic construction; 2. the product has large import volume; 3. the product has high export value or large export potential; 4. the product has big potential for energy efficiency and materials saving, and has environmental, economic and social benefits; 5. the product has internationally advanced technology as well as the technical basis to be developed before 2012.

The goal of formulating the Guidance Catalogue, as stated therein, is to “improve the Indigenous Innovation capacity of manufacturing equipment industry, feed the demand for manufacturing equipment in the national economy and key construction projects”; the Guidance Catalogue is supposed to “provide guidance for the enterprises to develop the most needed equipment products”, and “provide references to government, banks and institutions about how to support the manufacturing equipment industry”. (The link for the full text of the circular in MIIT website: http://www.miit.gov.cn/n11293472/n11293832/n11293907/n11368223/12937690.html)

USITO Notes: This new directive is part of the Chinese government efforts to encourage the homegrown equipment industries. Under the country’s 15-year mid- and long-term technology plan, the government is committed to build a much stronger manufacturing equipment industry, and thus “reduce the reliance on foreign equipment”. Government officials deem that China continues to lack core technologies and heavily rely on foreign technologies in important economic sectors like manufacturing equipment, and old policies like the 863 and 973 plans didn’t solve the problem of relying on foreign products. An example is that about a year ago, China launched the RMB 4 trillion stimulus plan to fight the financial crisis, the majority of the money ended up in infrastructure building, which in turn highlighted Chinese project managers’ reliance and preference on foreign equipment. As a result, authorities strongly believe China needs to introduce a new series of policies to build a stronger capacity in this sector.

USITO has prepared a brief analytical issue report on this Guidance Catalogue issue, as a follow-up to the January 2009 Issue Report No.628. Members please click here to download. For the Jan.2009 No.628 report, please click here.

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