An overview of instrumentation and measurement in the People´s Republic of China

THE instrumentation and measurement (I&M) field in the People´s Republic of China is rather different from that in many other countries. The guideline of our government policy in every respect, including I&M, has been self-reliance. For the past 36 years, over 3000 kinds (accessories and plug-in units are excluded as instruments in our country) of electronic instruments have been put into production with almost all their components, devices, IC´s, and even material produced domestically. In the recent decade, despite the fact that international cooperation and communication have been encouraged by our government´s “open-door” policy, I&M has not drifted far from this deeply rooted idea of self-reliance. The reason might be that being a very broad field, I&M is influenced by too many factors. However, the importance of international cooperation has been widely realized and we are anticipating and believing in more progress in the near future. From this background, our I&M has been closely related and even dependent on domestic instrument development as well as manufacturing. This viewpoint will be highly reflected in this overview.