The National Natural Science Foundation of China's (NSFC) Supervision Committee recently published this year's first edition of its work report, disclosing 20 particularly egregious cases of cheating.

The wrongdoers' fraudulent activities vary from plagiarism to presenting fake credentials.

But they share the same goal: to win the foundation's financial support.

The foundation's move is laudable because it could deter some potential offenders.

The downside of the story, however, is that the report revealed a worrying phenomenon in the nation's academic circles.

For many, obtaining endorsement for their projects and the money that comes with it is the ultimate goal. Science is very much secondary.

With this motive in the minds of the researchers, it is no surprise that sometimes the result is academic rubbish.

Lack of professional ethics is certainly a cause. But that is not a problem unique to the academic world.

Systemic problems in project pre-assessment, financial resource allocation and performance evaluation shoulder a bigger share of the blame.

When drafting budgets for research projects, prospects for the results play a minor role. It is the influence of the lead applicants that counts. Researchers with administrative titles and fame in their the fields have an overwhelming advantage over others.

This has driven many researchers in obscure fields to unusual methods when seeking project endorsement, as seen in the report by the NSFC.

An unreasonable evaluation system for academic performance was also a problem.

The system normally gives big weight to "research achievements" the number of published articles, the frequency of being cited by periodicals, and the number of projects backed by official support. More often than not, the standards for these numbers are very demanding and rigid.

At the same time the system ignores many factors such as the different opportunities of obtaining "achievements" in different fields and the quality of lectures by university teachers.

This also partly explains why researchers are so keen to initiate new projects.

On the other hand, once the projects are completed, academic evaluation is often perfunctory. Not many people seem to really care what the researchers have done and whether the result was worth the money.

In fact, the poor academic atmosphere in many of China's research institutions and universities is not news.

In recent years, dishonest professors or researchers have made quite a few headlines. Complaints from decent scholars and criticism by the media have often been heard.

But relevant parties still have not come up with any ideas, let alone taken any meaningful actions, to rectify the systemic problems.

Building an innovation-oriented society has become a national strategy and our scientists and professors should spearhead this course.

If a system that rewards genuinely creative, hard-working researchers cannot be established to replace the current, distorted system, the waste of money will continue. Academic rubbish will continue to be generated, and our prospects of establishing the desired innovative society will be bleak.

(China Daily April 4, 2006)