China leads US in global competition for key emerging technologies

A new report has revealed that the United States and many Western countries are far behind in the race with China in developing advanced technologies and retaining talent. The report noted that Beijing is establishing a monopoly in some areas with a "stunning lead" in 37 out of 44 critical and emerging technologies.

The report is released by Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) after tracking defence, space, energy and biotechnology.

The report showed that, in some fields, all of the world's top 10 research institutions are based in China. The study also urged greater research investment by governments.

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The report published on Thursday is funded by the US State Department. The study found that the US was often second-ranked, although it led global research in high-performance computing, quantum computing, small satellites and vaccines.

The report said: "Western democracies are losing the global technological competition, including the race for scientific and research breakthroughs."

The study has urged the democratic nations to collaborate more often to create secure supply chains and "rapidly pursue a strategic critical technology step-up" as it highlighted that China had established a "stunning lead in high-impact research" under government programmes.

The report mentioned that over the past five years, "China generated 48.49% of the world's high-impact research papers into advanced aircraft engines, including hypersonics, and it hosts seven of the world's top 10 research institutions".

The report said: "Our research reveals that China has built the foundations to position itself as the world's leading science and technology superpower, by establishing a sometimes stunning lead in high-impact research across the majority of critical and emerging technology domains."

"The critical technology tracker shows that, for some technologies, all of the world’s top 10 leading research institutions are based in China and are collectively generating nine times more high-impact research papers than the second-ranked country (most often the US)," the report added.

(With inputs from agencies)

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