Removing bottlenecks, creating breakthroughs in science and technology development

Kinhtedothi - On February 17, at the 9th Extraordinary Session, the 15th National Assembly discussed the draft Resolution on piloting a number of policies to remove obstacles in science, technology and innovation activities.

Vice Chairman of the National Assembly Nguyen Duc Hai chaired the meeting. Photo: Quochoi.vn

Ensuring the "output" of scientific and technological research

At the discussion session, National Assembly deputies agreed on the necessity of issuing a National Assembly Resolution on piloting a number of policies to remove obstacles in science, technology, innovation and digital transformation activities.

Contributing ideas to ensuring the “output” of domestic scientific and technological research, National Assembly delegate Hoang Minh Hieu (National Assembly delegation of Nghe An province) expressed the view: it is necessary to supplement policies, focusing on having policies to make the State the first and most important customer for domestic scientific and technological research results. Experience from other countries shows that this is a very important issue.

National Assembly Delegate Hoang Minh Hieu (National Assembly Delegation of Nghe An Province) proposed ensuring the "output" of domestic scientific and technological research. Photo: Quochoi.vn

The delegate gave an example, for the semiconductor chip manufacturing industry, the development history of this industry shows that, without the State's programs on the consumption and use of semiconductor chips in the 1950s and 1960s, chip manufacturing enterprises at that time would not have had enough resources and motivation to continue investing in research and development of advanced semiconductor chips as they do today. Ensuring the use of research and development results in State programs also demonstrates confidence in the capacity of domestic scientists and scientific and technological organizations.

According to delegate Hoang Minh Hieu, currently, our country's legal system in the provisions of the Law on Bidding and the Law on Science and Technology has some provisions referring to this policy but they are still not specific and according to many studies, they are not feasible in practice. Therefore, it is necessary to study to remove obstacles and soon put this policy into practice.

National Assembly Delegate Nguyen Anh Tri (National Assembly Delegation of Hanoi) speaks at the parliament. Photo: Quochoi.vn

Speaking at the parliament, National Assembly delegate Nguyen Anh Tri (National Assembly Delegation of Hanoi) gave an example: “The National Institute of Hematology and Blood Transfusion has researched and created a red blood cell panel (an antigen system that searches for abnormalities to ensure safe blood transfusion) that is both cheaper than the commercial price and suitable for the red blood cell characteristics of Vietnamese people. However, to commercialize, supply the whole country and replace foreign panels, the procedures are very difficult.”

National Assembly delegates also agreed that research institutions should be allowed to establish businesses to transfer research results and apply research results into practice, thereby avoiding the situation where research is "put in the closet" after completion.

Removing mechanisms for science and technology

In response to comments from National Assembly deputies, Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung said that the drafting agency proposed a new name: Resolution on piloting a number of special policies and mechanisms to create breakthroughs in the development of science, technology, innovation and digital transformation.

According to the Minister, the pilot resolution does not have the ambition to remove all bottlenecks, especially when the resolution is prepared in a short time, but focuses on piloting a few special policies and mechanisms under the authority of the National Assembly that are basically clear and can be implemented immediately, hitting long-standing bottlenecks, hitting urgent issues to create breakthrough development, and immediately implementing Resolution 57-NQ/TW of the Politburo.

Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung gave an explanation speech. Photo: Quochoi.vn

At the upcoming 9th Session, the National Assembly will pass the Law on Science, Technology and Innovation, the Law on Digital Technology Industry, and other related laws. This will be an opportunity to continue to address more fundamentally institutional, policy and mechanism issues for science, technology, innovation and digital transformation.

“We will study and incorporate the opinions of the delegates when finalizing these laws. Taking into account the opinions of the National Assembly delegates, we will consider removing from the resolution some policies that require more time to study and comprehensively evaluate their impacts, such as the policy on the autonomy mechanism of science and technology organizations,” informed Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung.

Discussing at the meeting hall, National Assembly delegates gave suggestions to further improve regulations on reforming financial management mechanisms in implementing scientific and technological research, granting autonomy in using research funds, and accepting risks in research.

According to Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung, this Resolution pilots the mechanism of spending on most research without committing to the final results; the State will manage through evaluating the research stages to continue funding, evaluate research facilities with results to assign the implementation of the next topics. The draft resolution allows the State to provide money for research through the fund mechanism, stipulates exemption from civil liability and does not have to refund the funds if the research does not achieve the expected results.

The 9th extraordinary session of the 15th National Assembly. Photo: Quochoi.vn

“With those special policies and mechanisms, with the distinction between basic research and applied research to have different policies and management mechanisms, creating openness for both, the state budget expenditure for science and technology, which is currently 1%, will increase to at least 2% as prescribed by the Law on Science and Technology and be effective,” said Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung.

Researchers are allowed to participate in establishing and operating businesses.

Regarding the regulation on commercialization of research results, Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung said that this is also a major and long-standing bottleneck. Research results must be commercialized to contribute to socio-economic development. The resolution piloted the permission for research institutions to own and have autonomy over research results, with assets formed from research to proactively commercialize immediately after the end of the research. Researchers are also entitled to at least 30% of commercialization results, and are allowed to participate in establishing and operating enterprises.

“These are very strong policies to commercialize research results, including research results from previous years, creating benefits for both the country and the individual, because when research results are commercialized, the State will collect taxes, create jobs, and the country will have a higher level of science and technology. This is an indirect way for the State to recover expenses for science and technology...” - Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung informed.

Concluding the discussion, Vice Chairman of the National Assembly Nguyen Duc Hai emphasized that through the discussion, National Assembly deputies contributed many opinions on policies to remove obstacles in science and technology activities, innovation, and national digital transformation such as regulations on the autonomy mechanism of public science organizations, management of annual and multi-year state budget funds; product allocation, management and use of funds and resources for science and technology development from both the state budget and resources from businesses and society... These are dedicated and responsible opinions that need to be carefully studied to complete the resolution and have been fully recorded.

The Vice Chairman of the National Assembly said that the National Assembly Standing Committee will direct the verification agency to closely coordinate with the drafting agency and relevant agencies to study the opinions of National Assembly deputies to fully absorb, explain, and promptly complete the Draft Resolution to submit to the National Assembly for consideration, decision, and approval at this Session.

Source: https://kinhtedothi.vn/thao-go-diem-nghen-tao-dot-pha-phat-trien-khoa-hoc-cong-nghe.html