The Global Innovation Index 2016 was published yesterday on Monday 16th August by Cornell University, INSEAD, World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), which is a comparative analysis of 128 countries’ capacity for innovation.
A key highlight from the report is the prediction of ‘modest growth for 2016, no significant improvement from 2015, and a slight pick-up of growth in 2017’. Policy makers are prompted to move away from austerity policies which – the report suggests – ‘shrink rather than expand longer-term investments’.
As investments in research and development (R&D) and innovation are seen as ‘central for economic growth’, the report recommends that ‘more efforts are needed to return to pre-crisis R&D growth levels’ and that the ‘observed innovation expenditure slowdown’ needs to be avoided.
The GII of course allows countries to create an innovative environment through providing evaluations of factors, metrics and tools used to calculate innovation. ‘The GII relies on two sub-indices—the Innovation Input Sub-Index and the Innovation Output Sub-Index— each built around pillars. Four measures are calculated.’
In the top 10, Switzerland remains at number 1 for the sixth consecutive year, while the rest of the top 10 ranked economies show upward and downward movement.
As for the top 25 leading economies, the report suggests this shows stability as they are occupied by high-income countries that ‘consistently lead in innovation’:
‘In past years, hardly any country moved in or out of this group of top performers. This year some notable changes take place within the top 25, in part because of the inclusion of new indicators. Notably, for the first time a middle-income country—China—is among the top 25.’
The report also highlights new efforts in innovation diplomacy, which has come from policy makers worldwide looking for ‘new ways to shape and influence’.
‘Although there is no agreed definition of ‘innovation diplomacy’, the term is widely considered to include publicly funded support for the following four types of activities:
- Exerting soft power and influence through the attractiveness (to talent, ideas, and investment) of a nation, region, or cluster as an innovation hub;
- Developing early-stage international pre-commercial and commercial partnerships between businesses, or between businesses and universities, that sow the seeds for future national economic growth and competitiveness;
- Creating the framework conditions (intellectual property regimes, migration rules, trade conditions, and information about opportunities and threats) for regional and global innovation partnerships to flourish; and
- Encouraging and enabling collaborations between public, private, and non-governmental actors to address global grand challenges from health pandemics to climate change.’
A toolkit to encourage and support this endeavour includes:
- Incentivising collaboration through new funding opportunities;
- Influencing policy frameworks and conditions;
- Improving access to information and capabilities;
- Clarifying national priorities and objectives for innovation to chosen partners; and
- Addressing cross-border innovation challenges.
Funds, such as the Newton Fund, help support these collaborations in three types of activity:
- ‘People: increasing capacity in science and innovation, individually and institutionally, in partner countries;
- Research: establishing research collaborations on development topics; and
- Translation: translating science into commercial activities and creating collaborative solutions to development challenges and strengthening innovation systems.’
The report also provides some key points for encouraging innovation:
‘First, it is vital to innovate from within the organization and to include a talent pool to bring in fresh perspectives and new skills unencumbered by traditional approaches.
Second, it is essential to encourage experimentation instead of shying away from it. This includes enabling employees to not fear failure but accept it, learn from it, and work to find a better solution.
Third, to ensure that innovation is not limited to thinking alone, it is important to reward the execution of novel ideas. Taking a concept and bringing it to life in the real world is what makes innovation more than fancy thinking.
And finally, an organization must be willing to actively seek out external players that can provide resources that complement and accelerate its innovation path.’