Does a country's publication of excellent international recognized science and technology (S&T) articles have any relation to its status as a giant in S&T? And how to grow concern about the health of the country's scientific publications and how to strengthen the dissemination of scientific information? These questions need the attention of the government and science journal editors. Some help in answering some these questions can be gained by comparing some existing data: (1) The exponential growth of scientific publications has paralleled to the development of the science and education for the last two hundred years in the world. (2) World S&T article output increased by almost 40 percent from 1988 to 2001, and has been largely driven by growth in Western Europe, Japan, and several emerging East Asian S&T centers (South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan region, and China). (3) The output of academic articles in China over the past six years grew in parallel to the input of science and technology. Relevant data shows that the Chinese authors' S&T papers collected by SCI grew at an average rate of 19 per cent each year from 1997 to 2002. The ratio of scientific and technological input to China's gross domestic product (GDP) in the past six years (1997-2002) increased at an average rate of 0.11 per cent. And over the last 14-year period S&T article output rose almost 5-fold in China but on a per capita output basis of worldwide trends in S&T article output, China remains well below the world average. Through a market survey of Chinese & foreign scientific publications and market demand and in the view of Chinese high ratio of R&D investment to GDP, the authors foresee bright prospects for Chinese scientific and technical periodicals in the future and also offer some suggestions to achieve these accomplishments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]