Japan Think Tank's Lament ... "Science and Technology Already Surpassed by China" [Reading Science]

Japan Economic and Industrial Research Institute Publishes April Report
Public Investment Decline and Internationalization Stagnation Cited as Causes

[Asia Economy Reporter Kim Bong-su] "China has surged ahead, the United States is far ahead, but Japan is actually falling behind."

A major Japanese think tank recently released a report pointing out that Japan has already been overtaken by China in scientific and technological competitiveness and is actually falling behind compared to the US and China.

According to the Ministry of Science and ICT on the 8th, the Economic and Industrial Research Institute, a major Japanese think tank, released a report last month comparing scientific and technological capabilities based on the scientific paper performance of Japan, the US, and China. According to this, Japan is lagging behind the US and China in terms of scientific paper output, which is a measure of scientific and technological capability. China had only 150,000 papers (based on SCI publication standards) in 2010, but this increased threefold to 500,000 in 2019 over ten years. The US also maintained its position with 590,000 papers as of 2019. However, Japan published about 100,000 papers annually during this period, remaining at about one-fifth the level of the US and China.

The report analyzes the stagnation of public research and development investment as the main cause and points out that "Japan is showing a relative decline in scientific and technological capability in research papers." The report especially notes that "while the US and China show signs of decoupling in advanced technologies, researchers maintain close connections, but the internationalization of Japanese academia is delayed," and emphasizes that "internationalization should be promoted in advanced technologies, especially in computer science fields including artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, where Japan is falling behind."

It also urged extreme caution regarding the leakage of technology in fields where Japan is still ahead to countries like China. The report advises, "It is important to organize researcher databases, personnel, and think tank functions that can extract technologies that pose security issues to prepare countermeasures against technology leakage," and adds, "In university patents and university ventures, attention is needed to the necessity of technology protection by combining intellectual property rights through patents and trade secrets (corporate secrets not legally protected)."

Regarding risks arising from the US-China technological hegemony competition, the report emphasized a "paradigm shift." It states, "In the case of US-China friction, existing risk management that identifies risks in advance and prepares countermeasures is insufficient," and points out that "it is necessary to accept uncertainty itself and adopt a resilient approach to minimize damage afterward."

The report also advised strengthening the 'intelligence function' for acquiring and managing scientific and technological information and knowledge in both the public and private sectors. It notes, "As high-tech friction between the US and China intensifies and competition related to international scientific innovation and business innovation deepens, both the public and private sectors need to strengthen intelligence functions," and points out that "Japanese companies lag behind American and European companies in awareness of competitive intelligence, so enhancing international intelligence functions is essential."