The total amount of human resources in science and technology in my country ranks first in the world, and improving quality in the future is the focus
Science and Technology Daily reporter Tang Ting
What is the overall situation of my country's science and technology human resources? What are the characteristics and trends of the flow of researchers? … The "Science and Technology Human Resources Development Research Report (2018)" (hereinafter referred to as the report) released a few days ago gives the answer.
The report’s research results show that, regardless of factors such as college upgrades, deaths and going abroad, as of the end of 2018, my country’s total scientific and technological human resources reached 101.545 million, and the scale continues to remain the world’s largest. Improving quality should become the focus of future scientific and technological human resource development strategies.
The quantity of human resources in science and technology requires quality
Huang Yuanxi, an associate researcher of the China Academy of Science and Technology Innovation Strategy Institute who has long been engaged in scientific and technological human resources research, participated in the preparation of the report. In her view, a concept that needs to be clarified is that scientific and technological human resources are not the same as scientific and technological talents. Scientific and technological human resources include not only people working in scientific and technological positions, but also people with the potential to engage in scientific and technological work, reflecting the reserve level and supply capacity of scientific and technological human resources in a country or region.
The number of R&D researchers per 10,000 working population is an important indicator to measure a country’s innovation capability, and it is also an important indicator to measure the level and quality of human resources in science and technology. The report shows that in 2017, the total number of R&D researchers in my country ranked first in the world, but the number of R&D researchers per 10,000 working population was only 22.4 person-years, which is a significant gap compared with 103.4 person-years in France and 100.1 person-years in Japan.
The same gap exists in the density of human resources in science and technology, which refers to the proportion of human resources in science and technology in the total population. Generally speaking, if a country or a region has a high density of human resources in science and technology, the potential for technological innovation is relatively large. Huang Yuanxi said that since 2005, the density of human resources in science and technology in my country has been increasing, but compared with developed countries in the world, there is still a lot of room for improvement.
"In the future, my country's scientific and technological human resources development should continue to maintain the overall advantage and continuously improve the quality level to meet my country's development needs in the new era of transforming the development mode, optimizing the economic structure, and transforming the growth momentum." Huang Yuanxi believes.
The situation of overseas return of scientific researchers continues to increase
The report uses the Chinese scientific research personnel database of "Scientist Online" as the research sample, adopts a random sampling method, selects 100,000 complete resume samples, and analyzes the flow of scientific research personnel.
"The results show that the scope of the flow of scientific research personnel in China covers 117 countries. From the perspective of the flow direction, although the flow of scientific research personnel in China is mainly manifested as a net outflow, in recent years, the return of scientific researchers has been increasing, and the returnees are mainly from some developed countries. "Zhejiang Tsinghua Yangtze River Delta Research Institute Regional Innovation Big Data Center Director Zhiqiang introduced.
When analyzing the reasons for the increasing return of scientific researchers, Wu Shuai, an associate researcher of the Chinese Academy of Personnel Sciences, believes that this is closely related to the rapid improvement of China's economic and technological strength and cultural identity.
"With the rapid development of China's economy and the transformation and upgrading of industrial structure, it has brought many opportunities for innovation and entrepreneurship while narrowing the gap between domestic and foreign life. At the same time, China's increasing investment in scientific research is obvious to all around the world. With the deepening of the reform of the talent development system and mechanism, the salary of scientific researchers has also been significantly improved. These are the direct reasons for attracting overseas scientific researchers to return." Wu Shuai analyzed.
In this regard, Hong Fan, an associate professor at the People’s Public Security University of China, also expressed similar views. He believes that based on the current fierce international competition for scientific and technological talents, it is particularly important to pay attention to the accuracy and coordination of talent introduction policies. The experiences and practices of developed countries and emerging economies in attracting outstanding scientific and technological talents are worth learning and learning from.
Regional distribution of scientific and technological human resources training and mobility is not balanced
Higher education graduates are the most important source of human resources in my country's science and technology. The report pointed out that the regional distribution of scientific and technological human resources training in my country is uneven. The eastern region has a large total training volume and high density; the central region is relatively balanced, with small differences in the total training volume and density of each province; and the western region has a small total training volume and low density.
"The above-mentioned imbalance is related to the distribution of universities in different regions, the educational structure of talent training, and the total number of local populations." Du Yunying, an assistant researcher at the Chinese Academy of Educational Sciences, analyzed that the higher education resources in the western region are relatively weak and the technology cultivated The number of human resources is relatively small. At the same time, the greater challenge facing the western region is how to create an environment to retain and attract scientific and technological human resources.
The report shows that the large-scale domestic flow of scientific research personnel is mainly concentrated in the Bohai Rim, Yangtze River Delta, Guangdong, Shaanxi, and Hubei. Eastern provinces play an important role in the talent flow network. Sichuan, Hubei and other central and western provinces are transported to the eastern provinces on a large scale. Talent.
"The flow of scientific research personnel is closely related to the regional economic and technological innovation strength, remuneration and living comfort conditions, and also has a certain relationship with the regional industrial development foundation. Overall, the current uneven flow of scientific research personnel is benign Yes, it shows that researchers have more choices.” Zhiqiang thinks.