India's innovation capacity lags most BRICS nations: Economics Survey

New Delhi: India ranks lower than most BRICS nations in terms of innovation despite logging a double-digit growth in the Research and Development (R&D) sector in the past few years, says the Economic Survey 2014-15.

"According to the Global Competitiveness Report 2014-15, India's capacity for innovation has been lower than that of many countries like the US, UK, South Korea, and even other BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) except Russia," the Survey said.

The report ranked India 48th in terms of innovation with score of 4, compared to China's ranking at 40 (score 4.2) and Brazil 44 (score 4.1). Russia ranked 66th with a score of 3.8. This is also exhibited through India's poor score on university-industry collaboration on R&D as compared to some other BRICS nations like China and South Africa, it added.

"In terms of patents granted per million population, India fares badly compared to other BRICS countries," the Survey said. In company's spending on R&D too, India is far below China, it added. "Only in terms of availability of scientists and engineers, India scores better or is equal to other BRICS countries," the Survey said.

This is despite a consistent double-digit growth in the last few years in the R&D sector. The growth registered in 2012-13 stood at 20.8 per cent, while professional, scientific and technical activities including R&D grew by 14 per cent in 2013-14.

According to a report by Zinnov Management Consulting, India's R&D globalisation and services market is set to double by 2020 to USD 38 billion. The study estimated overall addressable R&D globalisation and services opportunity at USD 170 billion as of 2014.

Currently, only USD 55 billion of this opportunity is addressed globally. "India's share of the addressed market is 33 per cent with in-house R&D centres contributing USD 11.3 billion worth of services to their parent companies," the Survey said.