The role of independent innovation in China's development was a topic of discussion among the members of the 13th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) on Sunday. 

China needs to build a national vaccine innovation center for special needs, suggested Chen Wei, a CPPCC member and leading researcher for CanSino's COVID-19 vaccine. 

She said the country should devise strategies for both its technological bottlenecks and advanced technologies to step up its national biosafety defense. The CanSino's COVID-19 vaccine being approved in several countries including China is proof of the long-term independent innovation in medical research, she said.

"We can only protect people's lives and health by keeping the key technology in our hands," said Chen. 

Building a healthy China is underlined in the draft outline of the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021-2025) for national economic and social development and the long-range objectives through the year 2035. 

Chen pointed out there are several weaknesses in China's biotech sector, including lacks of scientific planning, research focus, long-term mechanism, basic research, infrastructure and fast responding systems. 

To improve such disadvantages, Chen suggested that China invest and optimize research in cutting-edge areas such as biosafety and build up a top-notch core team for making breakthroughs in major areas. 

Chen also called for more government support to encourage scientists and researchers devote to basic science research for groundbreaking findings.  

Chen's emphasis on independent innovation echoes those made by another CPPCC member, Zhou Yumei. 

A researcher at the Institute of Microelectronics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Zhou has seen China's progress and challenges in the chip industry.

Zhou said the average compound annual growth rate of the chip design industry reached 23.4 percent during the 13th Five-Year Plan. China's independent chipset has been widely applied in Beidou satellites, supercomputers and other high-tech fields. 

Aside the achievement, she pointed out the industry development requires talent, capital and technology.

"China is still facing big gaps in the industry compared to the developed countries which lead the world," she said, "we need to step up our investment in such areas to make further contributions." 

In recent years, China has come across challenges in many areas related to semiconductors due to the lack of the core technologies, leading to its dependence on other countries.

She called on young talents to join the industry to break through the technological bottlenecks with government support. 

"China's chipset industry grew up from zero and keeps growing bigger, which is of significance to the present and the future," Zhou added.