Cultivating a workforce of young sci-tech talent a strategic priority: China Daily editorial

History has repeatedly shown that scientific revolutions are ignited by minds willing to challenge convention and test new ideas. Likewise, major countries secure their scientific standing by cultivating generation after generation of researchers who dare to venture into the unknown.

That is why President Xi Jinping stressed the need to create institutions that allow scientific inquiry to flourish — through stable support, better evaluation systems, stronger mentorship and an environment in which originality is rewarded.

Scientists need to be afforded the time, institutional backing and intellectual space to pursue discoveries that could shape not just the next research project, but the very contours of the next scientific era. That is why, when addressing the country's highest-level conference on science and technology in Beijing on Wednesday, Xi urged the nation to treat the building of a workforce of young sci-tech talent as a strategic priority.

The country needs to pay attention to discovering and cultivating more excellent young scientific and technological talents on the frontiers of scientific research, and increase the support provided to them. It also needs to pay attention to cultivating teenagers' interest in science, improving their scientific literacy and experimental ability, and attracting more teenagers with scientific research potential to devote themselves to the cause of science and technology.

The future of science lies with the youth, Xi emphasized.

The opening year of the 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-30) arrives at a time of intensifying technological competition and a rapidly shifting global innovation landscape. China's future depends more than ever on its ability to empower a rising generation of scientific researchers and innovators.

For young researchers and innovators, this is both a challenge and a call to action. It is essential that they integrate their personal aspirations into the broader cause of national development, and channel their youthful energy and creativity into the country's modernization drive.

Only by aligning individual ambition with the nation's progress can they truly contribute to the sci-tech transformation that lies ahead.

To provide an enabling environment for them, China should further reform its research evaluation system, which should reward true discovery, originality and creativity. Xi called for accelerating reforms that break the grip of the "four onlys" — judging researchers solely by papers, credentials, titles or awards — and replacing them with an evaluation system based on innovation, quality, practical effect and genuine contribution.

Great discoveries rarely emerge from systems that fear failure and entrench the status quo. Young researchers need an inclusive environment to pursue unconventional questions, confidence that long-term projects will survive assessments, and mentors prepared to nurture curiosity instead of demanding immediate returns.

The report released by the Xinhua Institute last month on Chinese youth captures another dimension of this call for action as it notes that the country's younger generation is not only the builder of national development but, increasingly, a contributor to global progress.

Whether in the spheres of artificial intelligence, biotechnology, green energy or advanced manufacturing, China's young scientists are taking on challenges that extend well beyond national borders. Scientific self-reliance and international contribution are not mutually exclusive. On the contrary, the stronger a country's indigenous innovation capacity, the greater its ability to contribute to humanity's shared scientific future.

The secret of a fulfilled life is to cultivate wide interests and allow those interests to deepen rather than narrow with age. That observation applies to countries as well as individuals. Countries that sustain scientific vitality encourage curiosity rather than conformity, exploration rather than complacency, and have the confidence to raise questions whose answers may not arrive for decades.

China's aspiration to become a leading country in science and technology by 2035 will therefore depend on whether today's young scientists believe their work will be supported, and their talent will be valued.