Full text: Development of china's news media in 2015

3. Carrying on with reform of the press system. In 2015, the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television issued its Plan of Implementation to Deepen the Reform of the Press and Publication, putting forward policy measures on reform in five key areas.

First, improving the management system of press and publication. It is to urge the Party and government departments to further regulate their relations with the press and publication enterprises and institutions under them, innovate the management system for online publishing and regulate online spread of the content, standardize management of information about the act of duty of press employees, establish a system for appraisal of the economic and social benefits of the press and publication, establish and improve a mechanism of market accession and exit from the market, strengthen copyright protection, and optimize publishing market management.

Second, enhancing the vitality of press and publication agencies. Efforts shall be made to deepen reform of not-for-profit press and publication agencies, carry on with the restructure of other press and publication agencies, explore equity incentive mechanism for state-owned publishing businesses, and allow state-holding publishing enterprises with necessary conditions to try out equity incentives. Encouragement and support shall be given to the integrated development of traditional and new media and publishing, and efforts shall be made to promote the merger and restructuring of traditional publishing businesses.

Third, developing and improving a multi-tiered publications and factor market. Efforts shall be made to establish a unified national information exchange platform for publications, press on with standardization of publication information, encourage and support trading of copyright, equity, trademarks and brands, encourage financial and social capital to flow into publishing, promote the in-depth integration of the publishing industry with new technology, enact measures of implementation for editing and production, and absorb social capital into pre-production and distribution of books and periodicals on the premise of publishing rights franchise.

Fourth, promoting the standardization and equal access to publishing public service system. Efforts shall be made to carry out a nationwide reading campaign, make rural libraries play a better role, give support to the development of the press and publishing industry of ethnic minorities, and improve the publishing public service work mechanism.

Fifth, opening up the press and publishing sector. Efforts shall be made to explore market-oriented, commercialized, industrialized, socialized and localized operation to promote the press and publishing sector to go out, press on with the "Classic China" international publishing, and "The Belt and Road Project" and other key projects, and press on with the program of giving support to the press and publishing sector of the border areas to go out.

In 2015, efforts were made to wind up the transformation of newspapers and periodicals not on current affairs under central and local authorities into enterprises, examined and approved the institutional reform plans of 105 newspaper and periodical publishers not on current affairs under central government departments, involving 141 newspapers and periodicals. In addition, specifically targeted reforms were carried out in 185 of such publishers, making the integration and structural readjustment of newspaper and periodical resources advance in an orderly manner.

4. Supporting quality newspapers and periodicals. By making efforts in strengthening quality newspapers and periodicals, it is expected to set a benchmark to guide the sound development of the industry.

Firstly, attention has been made to do a good job on the recommendation of the top 100 newspapers, 100 social science periodicals and 100 science periodicals (Known as "Top 100" for short). The recommendation of the Top 100 is a SAPPRFT-initiated program that has won extensive acclaim from the society since its launch in 2013. In 2015, the SAPPRFT organized a second session covering 99 newspapers, 100 social science periodicals and 100 science periodicals, representing the top most of the industry in China. They included both such mainstream newspapers as People's Daily and Liberation Daily, and such pacesetters in integrated development, transformation and upgrading as Zhejiang Daily and Dazhong Daily. Top science and social science periodicals are all on the recommendation list, such as high-quality and influential Party journals—Qiushi, Xinxiang Views (Xinxiang Pinglun), and Communist, traditional journals with lasting influence such as Readers, Literature for Children, and Harvest, up-rising new stars such as Special Focus and CBN Weekly, and internationally-renowned journals representing the development level of China's science such as Cell Research and Nano Research.

Second, endeavoring to enhance the international influence of China's sci-tech journals. China publishes in total 9,966 periodicals and journals, half of which, around 5,000, are sci-tech ones. The SAPPRFT urges the periodicals and journals to focus more on the quality of their content while making efforts to improve the academic level. In the last decade or so, the number of citations and impact of China's key sci-tech journals increased by 14% and 5.4%, respectively, with more and more of the journals being collected in major international search databases. For example, the number of Chinese sci-tech journals on SCI increased from 11 in 1987 to 142 in 2014. Among the journals included in SCI in 2013, 21 ranked among the top 30% in their discipline in terms of citation frequency and 20 in terms of impact. Among the Chinese journals included in Chinese S&T Journal Citation Reports in 2014, Light: Science & Applications entered into world top 100 three years after its launch along with Cell Research and Nano Research. China Association for Science and Technology and Chinese Academy of Sciences are leading the move from paper publication to e-publication, from single issue publication to collection publication, and from subscription publication to open access publication.

Third, building newspaper and periodical publication groups. China carries on with the in-depth reform in branding newspapers and periodicals and integrating resources to build a modern press industry which is cross-industry, cross-sector and cross-media. By the end of October, 2015, 20 major newspaper and periodical groups had taken shape, some regional, others specific to sectors such as automobiles, energy and finance, or to academic fields such as science, education, medicine and health. Popular industry periodicals, such as Readers, Zhiyin (Bosom Friend), Special Focus and Zhuozhong Publishing Group embarked on corporate and shareholding reform to establish modern media groups which are cross-industry, cross-sector and cross-media by integrating publication and human resources, and building financing platforms. During the 15 years since its launch, Special Focus has developed from a single periodical to a multi-periodical press group, including Vanguard, Special Health, Chutian Legal Journal and a new media center. On June 30, 2015, it was listed on the Third-board Market, marking the formal entry of China's mainland periodical business into the capital market. Founded in Lanzhou, Gansu Province in 1981, by the end of 2014 Readers had distributed 1.6 billion copies, earning RMB759 million in operating revenues. On December 10, 2015, the Readers Media Group got listed on the Shanghai Stock Market. Since its transition into an enterprise in 2007, the Beijing Zhuozhong Press Limited, a periodical publisher, has turned itself from a ten-periodical business into a company with one newspaper, 24 periodicals and three websites. Its annual turnover has increased from dozens of million yuan to 250 million yuan, reaping great social and economic benefits.