Both Lord Sainsbury, British Science and Innovation Minister, and Sir Christopher Hum, British Embassador to China, reiterated their anticipation in
Beijing recently that their continuous efforts on showing the creativity of UK in culture, science, commerce and education would pave the way for broader and more extensive bilateral cooperation and make UK "a natural partner " of China in the 21th century.
UK is apparently intensifying its endeavor for strengthening its ties with the fastest growing economy in the world. Right after his visit to China in July, 2003, British Tony Blair appointed a Task Force to look into ways to upgrade the "already very good relationship" between China and UK. The China-UK relationship is defined as a comprehensive strategic partnership in the Joint Statement announced during Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's visit to London last May.
The two countries are geographically far away and culturally different from each other. However, they may have quite similar impression about each other: conservative, nostalgic. That does not seem to reflect the dynamics that makes China the fastest growing economy in the world and inspires UK¡¯s ambition of erasing the gap with US in terms of innovative economic fields in a decade.
From April, 2003 through January, 2004, exhibitions, forums and contests were held in Beijing, Shanghai,
GuangZhou and
Chongqing under the Think UK program sponsored by the British Embassy to present to Chinese people, especially the young generation, innovative ideas of British performers and scientists.
At the end of 2004, Sir Christopher Hum declared in
Beijing that the year of 2005 was given a special name --- UK-China Partners in Science. The one-year campaign is initiated by the British government to explore more collaborations between UK and China on science and technology.
On January 17, Lord Sainsbury and Chinese Vice Minister of Science and Technology Dr. Liu Yanhua declared the launch of the year of British science at the 3th UK-China Hi-tech Forum in Beijing.
That will be followed by more than 40 activities, including conferences, forums and workshops throughout the whole year in major cities across China to showcase the latest development of China and UK on science and technology and promote the interactions between scientists from the two countries.
The campaign will focus on an array of cutting edge fields which call for innovations and have direct bearing on the life of the whole humanity, such as bioscience, clean energy, nanotech, stem cell, and environment.
At the press conference after the opening ceremony of the 3rd UK-China Hi-tech Forum, Lord Sainsbury, a frequent visitor to China, said he noticed China's "economic expansion at an extraordinary rate". He gave priority to four areas in the collaboration: stem cell, energy, electronics and space research.
As Minister of Science and Innovation, one of his responsibilities is to set technical standards. He told reporters at the press conference that there was very good cooperation between his country and China in this regard and consultations were underway on the setting of technical standards which he recognized was very important for the trade.
He briefed Britain's experience and vision in promoting innovation, including favorable general conditions for innovation and scientific research, huge investment in R&D, and government backed venture capital fund.
Obviously these messages have been applauded by China. On January 14 the Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the British National Space Centre and the China National Space Administration. It is a framework for the bilateral collaboration on space research. Lord Sainsbury said specific details of the collaboration would be decided in the further discussions.
In fact UK has been playing a role in China's space research. UK scientists are working for the Sino-EAS Double Star Project which was initiated by China to form an international space probe network. Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd has made a satellite for China as part of the international Disaster Monitoring Constellation.
The Institute of Calculating Technology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences inked an agreement of cooperation with UK-based hi-tech business Picochip on January 16. They will jointly develop products for wireless access technology. Picochip is participating into the global efforts on setting an international standard called IEEE802-16-2004.
Closer ties between China and UK will also help to promote the relations between China and EU which is the largest trade partner and tech supplier of China. This is particularly true when UK has assumed the presidency of G8 and EU this year.
China-EU High-level Forum in S&T Policy and Strategy will be held in May this year which will offer an opportunity for China and EU to enhance their dialogue on and share experience in mapping out strategies and policies for sci-tech development. It is designed to promote the bilateral cooperation on science and technology at a higher level.
And there are enough reasons to believe that UK will play a bigger role in Sino-EU partnership. At least all parties have manifested, with their actions, their willingness of exploring more possibilities of cooperation. And they have showed innovation in this process.
