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PP RUEHAST RUEHCN RUEHDH RUEHGH RUEHHM RUEHLN RUEHMA RUEHPB RUEHPOD
RUEHSL RUEHTM RUEHTRO RUEHVC
DE RUEHBJ #2813/01 2760041
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 030041Z OCT 09
FM AMEMBASSY BEIJING
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 6312
INFO RUEHOO/CHINA POSTS COLLECTIVE
RUEHRC/DEPT OF AGRICULTURE WASHDC
RUCPDOC/DEPT OF COMMERCE WASHDC
RHEBAAA/DEPT OF ENERGY WASHINGTON DC
RUEAUSA/DEPT OF HHS WASHINGTON DC
RUEHC/DEPT OF INTERIOR WASHDC 0767
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC
RUEAEPA/HQ EPA WASHDC
RUEHPH/CDC ATLANTA GA
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
RUEHZN/ENVIRONMENT SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY COLLECTIVE

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 05 BEIJING 002813 
 
STATE FOR EAP/CM-BRAUNOHLER, EAP/PD 
STATE FOR OES DAS MIOTKE, OES/EGC, OES/ENV, AND OES/PCI 
STATE FOR S/SECC-STERN, S/P-GREEN, EEB, AND ECA 
STATE PASS TO CEQ SUTLEY 
STATE PASS TO OSTP ROLF 
USDOE FOR INTERNATIONAL 
EPA FOR INTERNATIONAL/MKASMAN/GIANNINI-SPOHN 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: SENV ENRG KGHG TSPA TPHY TBIO CH
 
SUBJECT: AUSPICIOUS JCM: MARKING THIRTY YEARS OF U.S.-CHINA SCIENCE 
AND TECHNOLOGY COOPERATION 
 
REF:  BEIJING 435 
 
(U) SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED.  PLEASE HANDLE ACCORDINGLY. 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
 
¶1.  (SBU) Senior Chinese government officials from across China's 
science and technology (S&T) establishment are eagerly looking 
forward to engaging their U.S. government counterparts at the 
upcoming 13th Joint Commission Meeting (JCM) on Science and 
Technology, set to take place in Washington, DC on October 15-16, 
¶2009. This year's JCM is of particular note as it also marks the 
30th anniversary of the 1979 U.S.-China Agreement on Cooperation in 
Science and Technology, signed by U.S. President Carter and Chinese 
leader DENG Xiaoping as one of the first acts of normalization 
between the two countries. These bilateral discussions will cover a 
broad array of issues that will help determine the quality of life 
of the Chinese and American people over the next decades, in areas 
like clean energy, climate change, nuclear safety, and biomedical 
research.  The two countries also will identify synergies in 
respective science policies, with the goal of encouraging innovation 
and science education.  While there exist some irritants in some 
aspects of the S&T relationship, this has been one of the most 
positive aspects of the overall U.S.-China relationship.  The wide 
scope of areas covered demonstrates that not only is there great 
interest on both sides to continue this path forward, but also that 
the gap in capacity, which may have once existed, has diminished 
over time.  END SUMMARY. 
 
BACKGROUND:  30 YEARS OF S&T COOPERATION 
--------------------------------------- 
 
¶2.  (U) The JCM comes at a time of considerable pride in China. 
China has just concluded a massive nation-wide celebration marking 
the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of 
China (PRC), during which the role that science and technology has 
played in the country's development was highlighted.  Chinese 
officials at the JCM will note 30 years of bilateral diplomatic 
relations and stress the role that science diplomacy now plays in 
what Chinese leaders have been calling a positive, cooperative, and 
comprehensive relationship with the United States. (NOTE: The 1979 
Agreement called for the S&T relationship to be coordinated through 
high-level biannual Joint Commission Meetings (JCM), and the JCM now 
focuses respective policymakers on key themes in current U.S.-China 
S&T cooperation, while also establishing priority areas for future 
collaboration. The last JCM was held in Beijing in October 2006. END 
NOTE.) 
 
¶3.  (SBU) From its inception in 1979, the S&T Agreement has 
facilitated an era of robust government-to-government collaboration 
in a wide array of technical areas.  While China's S&T system 
remains considerably different from the U.S. model, it has drawn 
inspiration, ideas, and best practices from the United States 
through these interactions, ultimately shaping the evolution of 
China's S&T system.  More broadly, these exchanges have exerted a 
stabilizing influence on the U.S.-China relationship and provided an 
alternative avenue for dialogue even through periods of political 
tension.  Now, 30 years later, a highly-influential segment of 
Chinese society--the scientific community--has developed a stake in 
maintaining a constructive relationship with their American 
counterparts. 
 
¶4.  (SBU) Currently, there are more than 30 active agency-to-agency 
Protocols, MOUs, and sub-agreements, and more than 40 active annexes 
under the umbrella of the 1979 S&T Agreement, which 16 USG technical 
agencies and nearly the same number of Chinese government entities 
have signed with each other.  Areas under which S&T protocols exist 
and in which cooperative activities take place include agriculture, 
 
BEIJING 00002813  002 OF 005 
 
 
energy, health, environment, earth sciences, marine research, and 
nuclear safety.  JCM participants work to facilitate the exchange of 
scientific results, encourage greater access for researchers, 
establish science-based industries, invest in national science 
infrastructure, promote science education, strengthen the 
application of scientific standards, as well as drive environmental 
protection and natural resources management. 
 
CHINA LOOKING TO INVIGORATE THE JCM 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶5.  (SBU) No single issue is likely to occupy China's next 
generation of leaders more than energy security.  China is currently 
the world's fastest-growing energy consumer, accounting for 17 
percent of global energy consumption in 2007.  By 2030 this number 
is expected to rise to nearly 21 percent, making access to adequate 
energy supplies a high priority for China.  Not surprisingly, State 
Counselor LIU Yandong stated during her April 2009 visit to 
Washington that strengthening joint research in clean and renewable 
energy, including nuclear, wind, and solar power, would be her 
number one priority for this year's JCM.  She also enumerated a 
number of additional areas as priorities for discussion, including 
climate science, agricultural technology and food security, 
biomedical research for the prevention and treatment of acute 
diseases, basic research, and the establishment of joint research 
and development (R&D) centers and laboratories. (NOTE: Madam Liu is 
China's most senior female Chinese government official and a key 
figure in charting the course of Chinese S&T policy. In her role as 
State Councilor, she oversees the Ministry of Science and Technology 
(MOST) and the Ministry of Education (MOE).  She has a particularly 
positive relationship with Science Minister WAN Gang, who will head 
this year's Chinese JCM delegation.  END NOTE.) 
 
¶6.  (SBU) At this year's JCM meeting, MOST is likely to press for 
yearly senior-level JCMs, rather than biannual meetings, arguing 
that S&T, as a driving force for addressing the current financial 
crisis and for future development, requires that both sides meet 
more frequently than biennially for high-level consultations.  MOST 
officials recently noted that it has become common for other 
high-level bilateral dialogues in the political and economic spheres 
to occur once a year.  This suggests the Chinese may opt to initiate 
a discussion on how the JCM and the Strategic and Economic Dialogue 
(S&ED), for example, might relate to one another, particularly since 
the S&ED also serves as a discussion platform for a number of 
S&T-related issues like clean energy, climate change, environmental 
protection, and health. 
 
¶7.  (SBU) COMMENT: Both MOST and the Chinese Academy of Sciences 
(CAS) continue to focus on commercialization of technology and 
appear unwilling to take the necessary steps to strengthen basic 
research.  In a major policy speech in November 2008, CAS President 
LU Yongxian outlined nine key changes to the way CAS is to manage 
R&D, noting that more focus must be placed on transitioning basic 
research into activities that meet the country's "strategic 
priorities." Lu also said that technology transfer should receive 
the same emphasis as innovation and basic research, implying that 
research proposals that include a high degree of technology transfer 
would be viewed more favorably during this transition.  END 
COMMENT. 
 
AS S&T GAP NARROWS, NEW PROSPECTS FOR COOPERATION 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
¶8.  (SBU) The Chinese Government has been highly successful in 
drawing back foreign-trained (mostly U.S.) Chinese scientists and 
engineers through enticement programs (i.e., U.S.-equivalent 
salaries, large signing bonuses, appointments as laboratory 
directors, professorships, etc) designed to target scientists and 
researchers with specialties aligned with China's national strategic 
 
BEIJING 00002813  003 OF 005 
 
 
development plans.  Today, 81 percent of CAS academicians and 54 
percent Chinese Academy of Engineering (CES) academicians are 
Western-trained, while 72 percent of National Key Project Directors 
are scientists returned from abroad, according to research conducted 
by China S&T scholar Peter Suttmeier.  Despite the increasing flow 
of researchers returning to China, the United States continues to 
derive benefit from the vast number of Chinese-born scientists who 
have chosen to settle there.  With over 62,500 Chinese-born 
S&T-related PhDs now employed in the United States (74% of whom are 
at peak productivity ages between 30 and 49) benefits derived from 
researchers in the two countries maintaining ties with each other 
are greater than ever. 
 
¶9.  (SBU) Despite the obvious asymmetry between U.S. and Chinese 
scientific capabilities that existed in the past, and a sense by 
some that collaboration under the JCM process has been a one-way 
street only benefiting China, these activities have nonetheless been 
considered positive overall, and the JCM with China continues to 
enjoy broad support by numerous USG agencies.  The wide gap in S&T 
capabilities has narrowed, driven largely by Beijing pouring vast 
resources into modernizing China's S&T infrastructure in recent 
years.  China's rapidly rising S&T capacity is enabling new avenues 
of cooperation that can be mutually beneficial to both the United 
States and China. For example, China's increasingly sophisticated 
space program is yielding valuable new earth observation data sought 
after by government and private researchers around the world, 
including in the United States.  China's S&T proficiency in a number 
of other important areas like nuclear reactors, solar cells, and 
carbon capture and sequestration, are on the verge of reaching 
levels on par with Western developed countries. 
 
ONGOING CHALLENGES 
----------------- 
 
¶10.  (SBU) Despite rapidly growing levels of cooperation, many of 
the same problems that have plagued the S&T bilateral relationship 
persist and continue to be irritants in the relationship.  Key 
challenges for U.S. technical agencies collaborating with Chinese 
counterparts include a) difficulties with obtaining basic scientific 
data from Chinese partners (mistrust by Chinese national security 
entities), b) Chinese government S&T organizations' reluctance to 
cooperate with each other (stovepiping), c) a system that fails in 
fostering scientific integrity (academic fraud), d) unauthorized 
technology transfer and poor enforcement of intellectual property 
rights (IPR), and e) difficulties in ensuring that no direct benefit 
to the Chinese military has resulted from civilian S&T cooperation 
(low transparency in some Chinese civilian S&T organizations). 
Moreover, while Chinese S&T endeavors now have the potential to 
advance both U.S. and Chinese research on issues of global 
importance, many Chinese leaders still appear unready to acknowledge 
that this transformation has occurred, and they instead continue to 
claim that China deserves special treatment, as a developing country 
with S&T capacity that lags far behind that in industrialized 
countries. 
 
¶11.  (SBU) Most notably, USG agencies continue to face challenges in 
obtaining basic scientific data from Chinese agencies.  Chinese 
agencies frequently cite Chinese laws that prohibit them from 
sharing such data, with little authority or will to find common 
ground, which inevitably causes friction in the agency-to-agency 
relationship.  For example, both the National Aeronautics and Space 
Administration (NASA) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
Administration (NOAA) have long sought real-time (or near real-time) 
Chinese oceanographic data to support scientific and commercial 
operations, i.e., in forecasting extreme weather events on the rise 
due to climate variation.  The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has 
expressed that S&T collaboration in earthquake studies, water 
resources, and mineral information has been plagued for 15 years by 
a lack of "true and timely data exchange" among U.S. and Chinese 
 
BEIJING 00002813  004 OF 005 
 
 
counterparts attempting to collaborate under the S&T protocols.  The 
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is seeking access to 
Chinese high-temperature gas-cooled nuclear reactor data for use in 
safety analysis programs that would benefit both countries, yet 
China's nuclear regulator continues to stall, despite oral 
commitments to provide the data. 
 
¶12.  (SBU) On a more positive note, there has been significant 
progress on one of the major impediments to closer collaboration. 
Visa processing times for Chinese S&T-related personnel traveling to 
the United States have dramatically shortened since July, and visas 
are now typically issued in three weeks.  Until these changes took 
effect, extremely long visa processing times (on the order of 16 
weeks earlier this year) frequently undermined USG-funded efforts to 
bring Chinese officials to the United States, for programs aimed at 
advancing U.S. science and technology (and often commercial) 
interests in China.  Several USG-sponsored programs and meetings 
were delayed or cancelled due to visa processing backlogs, resulting 
in notable damage to the S&T bilateral relationship (REFTEL). 
 
¶13.  (SBU) Another important new development in the bilateral S&T 
relationship was the announcement in July 2009 by Energy Secretary 
Chu and MOST Minister Wan of joint clean energy research centers 
that will foster close collaboration on developing new and 
innovative energy technologies. 
 
30 YEARS OF SUCCESS STORIES 
-------------------------- 
 
¶14.  (SBU) While challenges have persisted, a relationship on the 
scale and breadth of that which the 1979 S&T Protocol governs also 
has yielded countless successes.  A selection of accomplishments 
achieved through U.S. - China collaboration are listed here. 
 
--The presence of a China CDC official at U.S. CDC in Atlanta and 
dozens of U.S. CDC staff resident in China ensured that accurate 
information about the influenza A/H1N1 outbreak is shared quickly 
and effectively. (2009) 
 
-- Argonne National Laboratory, U.S. EPA, the Chinese Academy of 
Sciences worked with U.S. and Chinese universities to model regional 
and local contributors to air quality, providing information to 
Beijing city officials in plans to improve conditions for athletes 
and spectators at the 2008 Summer Olympics. (2008) 
 
-- USGS monitored movements of waterfowl in China marked with 
satellite-transmitters to understand the role of waterfowl movements 
in the spread of the avian influenza. (2007) 
 
 
--U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) helped establish 
pilot projects for emissions trading of sulfur dioxide in multiple 
locations, to reduce acid rain in China and elsewhere.  (mid-2000s) 
 
--U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded $14.8 million 
over five years to the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention, for expansion of China's research activities in HIV/AIDS 
prevention, treatment and vaccine development.  (2002-2007) 
 
--The U.S. Forest Service cooperated with Chinese partners in 
several locations to survey natural enemies of kudzu (an invasive 
weed) to improve biological control of kudzu in the United States. 
(1999-2001) 
 
-- Cooperation under the 1998 Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Technologies 
(PUNT) agreement has improved safety and emergency management 
capabilities within China's nuclear sector, while providing a more 
transparent view of an industry that until recently was closed to 
outsiders.  The PUNT agreement also laid the foundation for 
 
BEIJING 00002813  005 OF 005 
 
 
commercial and economic successes currently enjoyed by U.S. nuclear 
firms operating in China. (1998-present) 
 
--NOAA established a joint working group with the State Oceanic 
Administration (SOA) to study climate variability.  (1997-present) 
 
--U.S. CDC and the Beijing Medical University collaborated to study 
child health issues, such as combating birth defects, disabilities, 
and health hazards due to environmental factors. (1991-present) 
 
--USGS and China Earthquake Administration established a China 
Digital Seismology Network in 1983 (operational in 1987) to 
supplement seismic monitoring in China. (1983-present) 
 
--NOAA studied marine sedimentation dynamics in the outflow of the 
Yangzi River, key for adapting commercial shipping access and 
flooding in the Delta. (early 1980s) 
 
¶15.  (SBU) COMMENT: U.S.-China S&T cooperation appears poised to 
reach even greater heights over the next several years, as research 
areas of global significance like clean energy, electric vehicles, 
climate change, health, environmental protection, and disaster 
mitigation, continue to attract high levels of attention by U.S. and 
Chinese leaders.  Moreover, as the many tens of thousands of 
U.S.-educated science professionals return home to China, we can 
expect rapid growth in researcher-to-researcher and 
institute-to-institute cooperation, especially as returnees seek to 
leverage relationships formed by studying and working on both sides 
of the Pacific. However, the most important challenge for the 
bilateral S&T relationship will be persuading China to move beyond 
its longstanding position that, as a "developing country," it should 
always be on the receiving end of S&T cooperation with the United 
States and recognize that establishing a more mature, peer-to-peer 
relationship will produce more gains for both sides.  Although as 
noted above, China's S&T establishment suffers from a number of 
significant problems, it is now blessed with world-class scientists, 
well-equipped laboratories and ample funding.  China, therefore, as 
an emerging world power and self-proclaimed responsible stakeholder, 
has new opportunities to demonstrate that it can be a true partner 
with the United States and other world technology leaders.  END 
COMMENT. 
 
HUNTSMAN