ChinaTech #2 Of Technical Standards
This new segment by Shobhankita Reddy is your go-to newsletter for updates and perspectives on China’s tech ecosystem.
A recent report announced that Xiao Chen, a Chinese scientist, will head the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC)'s technical committee for nuclear instrumentation. The committee is responsible "for setting the standards for nuclear facilities, systems and equipment as well as aspects of nuclear safety and security."
Xiao graduated from Beijing's Tsinghua University, also known as "the MIT of China." There, she specialised in precision instruments before spending two decades in the nuclear industry. Her career has included positions at the Chinese Institute for the Standardisation of the Nuclear Industry and the Standardisation Administration of China (SAC).
SAC, is the state body that sets and manages national standards in China and represents China within the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC), and other organisations.
In fact, Xiao's appointment coincides with a notable increase in the number of technical committees and subcommittees that China participates in. Against the backdrop of a heavy policy push, this number has gone up from 465 in 2005 to 668 in 2021.
In 2016, Xi Jinping described standards as the "common language of the world". A National Standardization Development Outline issued by the central government in 2021 emphasised the role of standards in building a "modern socialist country" and that "standards are the technical support for economic activities and social development, and are an important aspect of the country's basic system."
Some of the requirements mentioned by the plan are -
Setting up "standardisation research institutions," and "more than 50 technical standard innovation bases"
Setting up a national system that "integrates standards, metrology, certification and accreditation, and inspection and testing"
An alignment of "85%" between domestic and international standards
Reducing the average national standard formulation cycle to "less than 18 months"
An alignment of Chinese domestic standards with international ones should sound like a good thing. In fact, 20 years ago, standards were the Chinese state’s way of protecting domestic industry and adding friction to technology imports. Today, however, China’s increasing international footprint at SDOs is being looked upon with suspicion. This is a product of the irredentist, expansionist and aggressive policies of the Xi Jinping regime.
Under Section 6 of the outline titled "Improving the level of openness of standardisation", there is also a requirement to "support enterprises, social groups, scientific research institutions, etc. to actively participate in various international professional standards organisations."
The outline is striking not only in its detailed implementation strategy but also for the broad range of objectives the CCP envisions for technical standards. Standards are determined through an open, consensus-based, primarily industry-led due process and are meant to achieve interoperability between products. It is to the credit of the CCP that standards have been elevated to the level of a state-led grand plan for establishing the infrastructure specifications for different technologies.
The national strategy is the result of a research project called "China Standards 2035" conducted by the China Academy of Engineering under the guidance of SAC. A central dictum like that is sure to have spurred a flurry of standard-setting activity by industry, academia, and bureaucracy.
Despite increasing Chinese participation, it is unclear how skewed or unfair the decision-making by the SDOs has become. Standard discussions are technically very rigorous, span a few years, and are set via a majority vote or consensus. It is common for multiple standards to be passed, leaving the market to decide on their merits during commercialisation. Importantly, standards are voluntary and non-binding, and technical committees and subcommittees notorious for not being rigorous enough or dominated by vested interests lose the participation and adherence of many private players.
Reportedly, the Chinese state gives out subsidies and financial incentives for increased applications to and participation in Standard Development Organizations (SDO), an incentive that has caused 20% annual growth in Chinese ISO and IEC proposals. This has led to many low-quality proposals burdening the SDOs while giving the higher-quality applications a first-mover advantage in guiding the direction of the subsequent debates.
There have also been a few reported cases where Chinese participants were mandated to vote en bloc for Huawei's proposal concerning telecom standards, violating the SDO norms. Without data conclusively indicating a coordinated effort to subvert and manipulate the outcomes of the SDOs, there is an air of distrust for the Chinese state.
Another cause of concern is Section 2 of the outline, titled "promote the coordinated development of standardisation and science and technology innovation". This section focuses on a long list of critical technologies. A focus on standards in such early-stage research areas is not in the best interest of the development of the technology. It forces decisions to be made without complete knowledge and understanding of the technology and restricts experimentation to a narrow set of top-down standards.
The above concerns were underlined last year when, in response to a joint technical committee on quantum standards being chaired by a Chinese representative, the Biden Administration pushed for a new committee to be formed. This was an unusual move by the US government. Quantum technology is still nascent and far from any real market use cases. The duplication of effort on the part of international organisations for such a technology is unnecessary. The incident only demonstrated that amid adversarial competition between the two nation-states and broader technological decoupling, standards are coming to the fore as a new arena for a face-off.
It is in this light that Chinese appointments as chairpersons and secretariats of technical committees need our attention.