BEIJING: China’s science communicators have been encouraged to come up with more original, creative and better quality ways to popularize science, using everything from books to video games, by drawing inspiration from Chinese culture or recent scientific and technological achievements by Chinese scientists, experts said. Tuesday marked the release of a new national plan to popularize science and technology, which aims to make 15 percent of the population scientifically literate by 2025.
More science education resources and venues will be created, the scope and scale of science popularization will be expanded, the creation of original, quality science popularization works facilitated, talent nurtured and international exchange and cooperation promoted.
The plan was formulated by the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Publicity Department of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the China Association for Science and Technology. Li Yuqi, Party chief of the Shaanxi province branch of CAST, said that both the Party and the country consider science popularization important, with President Xi Jinping calling it as important as scientific and technological innovation.
“Science popularization is the basis of science communication. It helps kindle scientific aspirations and promotes public scientific literacy, and plays a key role in China’s culture of innovation,” Li said during the opening ceremony of the annual meeting of the China Science Writers Association.
–The Daily Mail-China Daily news exchange item
