US urged to follow China’s lead in treating data as an economic asset
As China deepens the commercialisation of its vast troves of data, the United States needs to develop its own national data strategy that treats data as an economic asset to better position itself to prevail in emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and robotics, a key US congressional advisory body has said.
In a report published on Tuesday, the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission (USCC) warned that the US risks ceding global leadership in setting global data standards to China, which would give Chinese firms an advantage over their US counterparts in industries where data is a central pillar of development.
“Standards are difficult to revise once adopted,” the report said. “Engaging now would be more effective than seeking to unwind an established standard later.”
In 2020, Beijing designated data as a key factor of production, elevating the resource to a core strategic asset at the centre of the country’s economic, industrial and military development.
Since then, China’s data economy has begun to “flourish” through the establishment of thousands of data exchanges nationwide and the introduction of pilot programmes that treat data as a resource to be shared and traded, the report said.
It described Beijing’s approach to data as the same “top-down” industrial policy approach that has made China a leader in other industries such as advanced manufacturing.