Think tanks highly valued in Jiangxi

The first Jiangxi Think Tank Summit was held in Nanchang, Jiangxi province on Oct 16 in an aim to leverage the role of think tanks to provide intellectual support for the progress of the province.

More than 300 domestic and foreign academics and professionals, including Wu Hequan and Xiang Qiao — both academicians at the Chinese Academy of Engineering. Zhu Jiankang, an academic of the American National Academy of Sciences, also joined the meeting.

Wu said he believes the global new-generation information technology market is growing rapidly. But the industry and economic structure of Jiangxi province that prioritizes "hard" industry with less focus on "soft" industry has hindered development of the province's electronic information industry.

"The government should open the database of tourism and water conservancy and provide tools to support the decision-making of these related sectors," he said.

Zhu Jiankang said global agriculture faces major challenges, and population growth and environmental pressures have deepened the crisis. Jiangxi is a traditional agricultural province. It is necessary to use biotechnology to promote development of modern agriculture.

It is crucial to produce agricultural products with local resource advantages, Zhu said.

Liu Qi, secretary of the CPC Jiangxi provincial committee, said think tanks are the source of innovative ideas and the "outside brains of party committees and governments".