CRI听力:Chinese Premier Highlights Innovation, Entrepreneurship

In recent years, robots are making great strides in China's manufacturing industry as an indispensable part of the workforce.

In the factory of Midea, the country's home appliance giant, 800 units of industrial robots were introduced last year to its Guangzhou plant to solve the shortage of affordable labor.

Manager of the engineering department at Midea's Guangzhou Plant Deng Yongge saw the improvement in production management when connecting the automated process with the so called "Internet of Things."

"If like before, I couldn't modify data even if I know we will get unsatisfactory results. But now things are different. I can make the correction immediately once I know the imperfection. It can help us to control the results."

In 2013, China overtook Japan and became the world's biggest market for industrial robots.

Last year, 56,000 industrial robots were sold on the Chinese market, up 54 percent from the previous year, accounting for 25 percent of the global market.

Minister of Industry and Information Technology Miao Wei says China has huge market potential in terms of replacing manpower with robots.

"In the past, half of the robots were used in the automobile industry. But now, the boundary has been pushed and robots have been popularized and used in electronic information and other industries."

Increasing numbers of start-up businesses are equipped with new technology like Midea Group.

The development of new technology and innovation has been highlighted in the country's development strategy in recent years.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Saturday reiterated that pledge at the start of a week-long science and technology campaign to boost innovation and entrepreneurship.

In the face of the "new normal" of slower growth, the government is vowing to upgrade industrial structures and further promote technological innovation and entrepreneurship.

For CRI, i'm Min Rui.