SCIO briefing on China's 1st National Day of Space Flight
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E-mail China.org.cn, April 23, 2016
China Space News:
Recently, the nation has been mourning the death of Liang Sili, one of China's pioneering space scientists. Meanwhile, people have pondered again the challenging question posed by famous scientist Qian Xuesen why China's schools fail to nurture outstanding talent. My question is how will China cultivate space talent in the future? Are there any specific plans or ideas?
Xu Dazhe:
China's achievements in the space industry can be attributed to both the old generation of patriotic and dedicated scientists and technicians and the subsequent generations of high-quality, innovative talent. As you can see, many chief engineers of satellite, rocket and other large-scale projects are quite young. As far as I can remember, many foreign officials have said that they fully recognize China's achievements in the space, but they were more impressed by China's untapped potential, because there are so many young talented people who can go on working for many years.
As for the challenging question posed by Qian Xuesen, I just want to say that the purpose of creating the National Day of Space Flight is to promote innovation and to create an atmosphere welcoming to talent. We need more original ideas and leading scientists. I knew Mr. Liang very well, while Mr. Qian was the first director of an institution where I worked. I had discussed the issue with Mr. Qian. He gave us great encouragement. He believed that the young generation is working harder and doing better than his generation. But we also noticed that we need to work harder to promote innovation. We must allow people to try new things and make mistakes. We have to develop more incentive policies. This is very important.
The Communist Party of China and the Chinese government have established many methods for honoring and awarding scientists and technicians for their major contributions to the country's space industry. But those contributing to other sectors will not be overlooked. Of the 23 owners of the Two Bombs and One Satellite Award, 12 had engaged in the space industry. Their honor has stimulated generations of space scientists and technicians. The ongoing solicitation of innovative lunar probe design is meant to increase public enthusiasm for innovation.
By the way, I want to share with you one of my stories. The year before last, I visited the United States and talked with the head of NASA. During the talk, I said that space activities have many purposes. First and most importantly, it should inspire dreaming. This is very important to mankind. Second, it should promote innovation. Third, it should be beneficial to people. Fourth, it should promote cooperation. An important space industry can give outstanding scientists and technicians a chance to distinguish themselves from others.
The challenging question posed by Qian Xuese has prompted us to think about many issues. In the future, we will cooperate with the Ministry of Education, the China Association for Science and Technology, the Communist Youth League Central Committee and other departments to further arouse public interest in scientific study and pass down the spirit of Wan Hu, a legendary space pioneer in ancient China, to our children and our children's children.
Takungpao:
My first question is about China's satellites. Could you tell us what benefits they have created? The second question is about China's space industry. What role has it played in China's economic and social development? As a strategic new industry, how can it create large benefits after receiving so much investment? When you answered the questions just now, you repeatedly said that the space industry has made great contributions to the improvement of people's livelihood. Could you give us some specific examples of this? What special benefits can people get from it?
Xu Dazhe:
It's true that the space industry needs a lot of investment, but it can also create great social and economic benefits and cultivate a lot of talent. The industry has a close connection to people's livelihood. There is a popular saying that the further the spacecrafts go, the closer the space technologies come to us. China's first satellite only played the song "The East Is Red" in space. That was its only goal. This story is known by many of you here. But today, our life is closely connected with space technologies and satellite applications. For example, before we leave home, we usually check the weather forecast. China's weather satellites enjoy a good reputation throughout the world. They have made great contributions to global atmosphere observation and weather forecast. If we want to make a journey, we will use a navigation satellite, positioning satellite and Earth observation satellite.
When we want to know global news, we will use direct broadcast satellites and communications satellites. In the hinterland, even medical care and education depend on distance services provided by satellites. As soon as we launched a couple of satellites for the High-Resolution Earth Observation System, 25 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government began to build corresponding data centers. Why did they do so? That is because the satellites are closely connected with our daily life. You might have read the news about the heavy metal pollution of soil. Here you need the help of remote sensing satellites, which can analyze land use and soil conditions. Satellites have also been used to monitor plant coverage, mineral exploitation and precision farming activities. They can also estimate grain output. When Ecuador was hit by a major earthquake, we immediately provided it with pictures of the quake-hit area before and after the disaster to help the victims. The United Nations set up a platform for space-based information for disaster management and emergency response in China. So, I have reasonable ground to say that the space industry has a direct bearing on our life. If we can obtain 3D elevation photos, they will help water conservation and urban construction projects. Just a few days ago, we held a meeting to study how to use space resources to help the targeted poverty reduction campaign. This is a major task of the 13th Five-Year Plan period (2016-2020). More than 50 million Chinese people need to be lifted out of poverty. Satellites can give us a lot of data. If we can make good use of them, they will help us in all circles of life.
The data provided by the Chang'e lunar probe project has offered important data to scientists for studying moon and space environments. Therefore, you can see that the benefits of the space industry are mostly intangible. Some people have made calculations and concluded that one unit of growth in the space industry can stimulate the growth of other sectors by 10 times or even higher. When the terminal-end application of a navigation satellite was upgraded, millions of people applied for registration, because the satellite is important to transportation and fishery industries. Just now, I talked about China's key space infrastructure. If we can build it in 10 years, it will create more social and economic benefits. By then, all communications activities can be done on broadband, even if you use a fixed network or mobile network.
Moreover, satellites can be used in public management and social governance, which are also important to us. Many departments have followed our progress closely. We are making satellite observation plans, but our schedule is too tight. We can't fully satisfy the needs of national economic development and social governance. This is the current situation: We can meet basic needs, but we can't meet all of them.
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