民用

• Pinyin: mín yòng
• Hanzi breakdown: 民 = 氏 + 一 — the people, civilians; 用 = 月 (vessel) + 丨 (handle) — to use, to apply

Meaning

For civilian use; civil. Describing technology, aviation, infrastructure, or equipment designed for ordinary public or commercial use, as opposed to military applications.

Commonly collocates with aviation (民用航空), technology (民用技术), infrastructure (民用建筑), and nuclear energy (民用核能). The military-to-civilian technology transfer is often described as 军转民. In China's defence policy, the boundary between 军用 and 民用 technology is a significant regulatory and strategic concern.

Examples

1. 中国民用航空局近年来持续推进低空空域管理改革，逐步放开城市与郊区上空供无人机从事物流配送、农业植保等民用商业飞行的低空权限。 In recent years, the Civil Aviation Administration of China has continued to push reforms in low-altitude airspace management, gradually opening up low-altitude permissions over cities and suburbs for civilian commercial flights such as drone deliveries and agricultural crop-protection operations.
2. 这项源于军事侦察领域的卫星遥感技术经过多年的民用化改造和成本优化，如今已被广泛应用于城市规划、农业监测和自然灾害评估等民用领域。 Satellite remote-sensing technology that originated in military reconnaissance has been adapted for civilian use and made more cost-effective over many years; today it is widely used in civilian fields such as urban planning, agricultural monitoring, and natural-disaster assessment.
3. 工程师们正在研究如何将原本专为军事通信研发的抗干扰加密技术转化为民用通信网络中的安全防护模块，以应对日益严峻的网络攻击威胁。 Engineers are studying how to turn anti-jamming encryption originally developed for military communications into security modules for civilian communication networks, in response to the growing threat of cyberattacks.

Usage Guide

Context: technology, aviation, policy, defence, industry

Tone: neutral

Do Say

• 随着超音速技术突破，多家航空商正评估民用超音速客机，以缩短洲际飞行时间。(With breakthroughs in supersonic technology, several aviation companies are assessing civilian supersonic passenger jets to shorten intercontinental flight times.)
• 在确保核安全达到国际最高标准的前提下，民用核能将稳步适度扩容，作为实现碳中和的重要低碳选择。(On the premise of meeting the highest international nuclear safety standards, civilian nuclear energy will be steadily expanded in a moderate way as an important low-carbon option for achieving carbon neutrality.)

Don't Say

• 将'民用'与'商用'完全等同 — 民用泛指一切非军事用途的使用场景，包含公益性和非营利性的公众应用；商用则专指以商业盈利为目的的使用，两者存在交叉但并不完全重合，在政策法规和技术标准文件中应注意区分 (Do not treat 民用 and 商用 as entirely synonymous — 民用 broadly covers all non-military applications including public-interest and non-profit uses; 商用 specifically refers to use for commercial profit; the two overlap but are not identical, and one should distinguish them in policy regulations and technical standards documents)

Origin & History

民 (the people, civilians) + 用 = 月 (a vessel in use) — to use, to apply. Together: for use by the civilian population as opposed to 军用 (military use).

Cultural Context

Generation: All ages

Social background: Universal