Xi uses tour of Mao’s home province to demand China become self-reliant in core technology
China must master core, advanced technology if the country is to overcome obstacles holding back its development, President Xi Jinping said during a high-profile tour of Mao Zedong’s home province that came as the U.S. further restricted the mainland’s access to vital semiconductors.
Xi made the remarks on Thursday during a visit to Hunan, a province better known for construction cranes and fireworks than cutting-edge innovation. As the birthplace of Mao, Hunan also carries symbolic importance as a “cradle” of communist values.
State media billed Xi’s tour as an important “red education” initiative, a term for propaganda propping up the party’s image, as the nation tackles the fallout from worsening diplomatic and trade ties with Washington. A U.S. ban on shipments of high-end chips based on American technology to China’s biggest smartphone maker, Huawei, took effect this week. The country’s biggest semiconductor manufacturer, SMIC, has also been singled out as a potential sanctions target over its links to the Chinese military.
“We must ensure key and core technologies are in our own hands, and the same for the manufacturing industry,” Xi was quoted as saying by Chinese state-own media on Friday. “Innovation is the most important trait in corporate management, and it is vitally important for us to climb the slopes and jump over the trenches,” he said during a visit to Sunward Intelligent Equipment, an industrial automation equipment maker based in Hunan.
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