The figure on the side shows the R&D Intensity in EU-25, US, Japan and China (1995-2005).
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After a period of slow but continued growth between 1996 and 2002, the EU-25 R&D intensity has been slightly decreasing between 2002 (1.89%) and 2005 (1.85%) (see Figure 3.1). Since in the US, the downward trend has come to an end, the gap in R&D intensity between the EU and the US is increasing again since 2002. The R&D intensity in Japan has been growing faster than in both the EU and the US over recent years. If the current trend persists, China will have caught up with the EU-25 by 2009 in terms of share of GDP devoted to R&D.
An examination of the individual Member States’ pace of progress after 2000, reveals a distinction between four groups of EU countries. A first group including the R&D-intensive countries Finland, Denmark, Austria and Germany, have been able to further increase their high R&D intensity and are pulling further ahead. Especially Austria has been able to progress very substantially over the recent years. France and Sweden experienced in the subsequent years a weakening of their growth performance and are now losing momentum. The new Member States Slovakia, Slovenia, Poland and Bulgaria, as well as Greece, and to a lesser extent Luxembourg, the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands are falling further behind since 2000. Conversely, most of the other new Member States, in particular Malta, Cyprus and Estonia, and to a lesser extent Spain, Ireland, Italy and Portugal, have been catching up with the EU average. At the same time, development gaps in terms of the production of scientific knowledge and technological innovation between EU regions, even between regions in leading Member States, remain substantial (see Eurostat data on R&D expenditure and personnel in the European regions). The European research landscape remains characterized by a high concentration of research effort in comparatively few Member States and, within them, in comparatively few regions.
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here (dated: 4 Apr 2007)
