First started in 1982, the "National Program for Key S&T Projects" is a critical component of the five-year plans for the national economic and social development. It is updated every five years and submitted for approval by the National People's Congress --the Chinese Parliament.

The objective of the Program is to find solutions to the scientific and technological bottlenecks in the national economic and social development.

The Program is funded by both the central and local governments, and supplemented by financial inputs from different industrial sectors and institutions. The government investment is in three types: completely free support, partially free support, and loans. The government investment on the Program during the Eighth Five-year Plan period (199 l-1995) was about 3.5 billion yuan.