China will increase the number of experts who review proposals

Morguefile

China's Ministry of Science and Technology last week announced a raft of reforms in response to a recent wave of scientific misconduct cases.

A ministry spokesman said the main goal is to increase 'transparency, equity and fairness' in managing science and technology programmes.

Among the proposed measures, the ministry plans to limit the influence of grant managers by expanding the database of experts it draws on to review proposals and evaluate projects.

Reviewers will also be randomly selected to reduce conflicts of interest, and a 'credit management system' will score the performance of evaluating experts.

All non-confidential projects administered by the ministry will be handled online by a searchable, open-access database.

Opinion of the proposals is divided in China's science community. Some applaud the efforts to limit project managers' power. Others are more sceptical about the credibility of the credit management system and doubt the measures will be applied to more than a fraction of research projects.