China should 'prioritise innovation,' according to Xi Jinping, and should be at the forefront of disruptive, modern engineering, and frontier technologies.

Beijing has talked about a variety of areas it wants to advance its expertise in since that speech in 2017, including artificial intelligence, 5G technology, and semiconductors.

Five years have passed since Xi's speech at the previous National Congress of the Communist Party of China, and the second-largest economy in the world now lives in a different world. It happens in the midst of a protracted trade spat with the United States, obstacles posed by Covid, and a shift in domestic political sentiment that have hampered some of Beijing's objectives.

The 20th National Congress, which takes place in Beijing once every five years, will get underway on Sunday. It is anticipated that the high-level conference will clear the way for Xi to continue serving as the Communist Party's leader for an unprecedented third five-year term.

Xi will evaluate China's mixed record of scientific and technological advancements. Charles Mok, a visiting scholar at Stanford University's Global Digital Policy Incubator, said, 'I agree it is a mixed bag.

As it strives to be the best, he claimed that China sets 'lofty' goals, but they are 'constrained politically and ideologically in terms of the means to achieve them.'

Due to tighter regulations and a declining economy, private tech companies are struggling. Due to recent export restrictions by the United States, China is still far from being self-sufficient in semiconductors. The mainland has increased its censorship as well.

However, China has made some noteworthy strides in fields like space exploration and 5G. The trade conflict is one of the unanticipated developments that may have hampered China's technological ambitions over the previous five years. It was started by the former president of the United States, Donald Trump, and it swiftly evolved into a tech conflict.

The Trump administration imposed sanctions on Huawei in 2019 and 2020. At the time, Huawei was one of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world and the market leader in China for 5G telecommunications equipment.

Huawei's smartphone business was destroyed by Washington's use of export prohibitions and sanctions to prevent it from obtaining the vital processors it needed. Governments that were viewed as U.S. allies attempted to prohibit Huawei from using their telecommunications infrastructure in the future.