New impetus needed if South Africa is to begin meeting R&D investment goals

In the drive for economic advancement and global competitiveness, innovation stands as a pivotal force, with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) highlighting that a modest single percentage point increase in research and development (R&D) spend can potentially elevate economic growth by about 0.13%. Yet, despite being Africa’s biggest and most developed economy, South Africa fails to make the grade as one of the world’s top R&D investors relative to GDP. Crowned as the global top spender in the OECD’s latest rankings – for 2020 – is South Korea, which leads with an impressive R&D-to-GDP investment ratio of 4.8%. The US follows with 3.42%, while Japan and German trail closely behind with 3.27% and 3.14% respectively. Finland and China also feature prominently, with ratios of 2.91% and 2.41% respectively. Competing the top ten are France with 2.35%, Italy with 1.53%, Spain with 1.41% and Turkey with 1.09%.