Communications of the ACM
Eu Warns It Lags Behind in Global Innovation Race
The European Union's (EU's) scientific and industrial innovation efforts lag far behind the United States and Japan, prompting the EU Commission to call for measures to promote private investment and greater business engagement in the application of research results.
A series of research and innovation indicators for the EU show that the United States was overtaking Europe by 49 percent in 2010, up from 45 percent three years earlier. Meanwhile, Japan's lead climbed from 32 percent to 40 percent between 2006 and 2010. Among the indicators analyzed by the Innovation Union scoreboard are license and patent revenue, new doctoral degrees, and business research and development (R&D) expenditures.
"The EU share of world R&D expenditure has decreased by a fifth over 15 years," says EU science commissioner Maire Geoghegan-Quinn. The EU's slice of the world R&D expenditure declined from 28.6 percent in 1995 to 23.4 percent in 2008, while at the same time Asia grew its share from 21.9 percent to 29.7 percent. "If we are going to grow our way out of the present economic crisis, innovation, investment in research, education, and technology is the way that we have to do that," Geoghegan-Quinn says.
From Associated Press
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