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From: Biniam Tekle (biniamt@dehai.org)
Date: Thu Jul 07 2011 - 12:31:57 EDT
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/enterprise/3290065/sub-saharan-african-slow-in-innovation-growth/?olo=rss
Sub-Saharan
African slow in innovation growth
By Louisa Kadzo | *07 July 11*
The newly published Global Innovation Index 2011 report ranks 125
countries/economies across the world in terms of their innovation
capabilities and results. The Report highlights those countries that achieve
more innovation outputs surmounting weaknesses from the input side -- the
efficient innovators -- and those that lag behind in fulfilling their
innovation potential. Innovation performances are analyzed in reference to
the income and regional groups.
The research defines Innovation to include new or significantly improved
product, processes and methods in the provision of services; in business and
organizational models; in low-tech industries; through creative imitation
and technological catch-up; at the public level or at the level of society,
all constitute innovations.
The GII is a collaborative effort of five Knowledge Partners, all
international leaders in the area of innovation, led by INSEAD, and
including Alcatel-Lucent, Booz & Company, the Confederation of Indian
Industry and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), a
specialized agency of the United Nations.
An Advisory Board of nine international experts from IOs, NGOs and academia
was constituted to contribute to the project at the research and
dissemination stages. In addition, the ranking, which is based on a
transparent and easily replicable computation methodology, was submitted to
a statistical audit by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European
Commission.
The GII is calculated as the simple average of two sub-indices, while the
Innovation Efficiency Index is the ratio of the two. The Innovation Input
Sub-Index gauges elements of the national economy that enable innovative
activities, grouped in five pillars: (1) Institutions, (2) Human capital and
research, (3) Infrastructure, (4) Market sophistication, and (5) Business
sophistication. The Innovation Output Sub-Index captures actual evidence of
innovation outputs, divided in two pillars: (6) Scientific outputs and (7)
Creative outputs. These pillars are divided into 20 sub-pillars, including a
total of 80 indicators.
A total of 24 countries from Sub- Saharan Africa are included in the
rankings, none of which made it to the top 30, and 17 of which are ranked
within the bottom 25. Not a single country from Sub-Saharan Africa region is
classified as high-income.
Regional leaders on the GII and the Output, Input, and Efficiency measures
are Mauritius, Nigeria, South Africa, and Côte d'Ivoire, while only
Mauritius and Nigeria achieve positions within the top 70 on the Output Sub-
Index. Six countries achieve the threshold on the Input Sub-Index: South
Africa (40th), Mauritius (46th), Namibia (49th), Botswana (62nd), Ghana
(65th), and Kenya (69th).
Among upper-middle-income countries, Mauritius (53rd overall) achieves the
top regional spot on the GII, while South Africa (59th overall) is the
runner-up, followed far behind by Namibia (regional 4th and overall 78th)
and Botswana (5th and 79th). South Africa tops the regional Input Sub-Index
(40th globally). Ranked 83rd on the Output Sub-Index, South Africa achieves
placement among the top 40 in only two areas: resident patent applications
through the Patent Cooperation Treaty and computer software spending (8th
globally, with 0.9% of GDP).
Lower-middle-income countries all have poor performances. These are Nigeria
(7th regionally and 96th overall), Senegal (8th and 100th), Swaziland (9th
and 101st), Cameroon (10th and 103rd), Côte d'Ivoire (18th and 117th), and
Sudan (24th and 124th).
Although Nigeria's position on the GII is rather low (96th), this country
obtained the top regional position on the Output Sub-Index, where it is
ranked 62nd, and has the second-best Efficiency Index score globally.
Low-income countries Ghana (70th) and Kenya (89th) get relatively high
scores -- both within the regional top 10 -- reaching 1st and 3rd place,
respectively, in the overall low-income group. Of the remaining countries in
this income group and region, Tanzania, Uganda, and Mali fare relatively
better on the Output Sub-Index (their ranks are in the fourth quintile);
while the scores of Rwanda, Zambia, and Malawi are driven by somewhat better
scores on the Input Sub-Index (ranking in the fourth quintile). Of the rest,
Madagascar, Côte d'Ivoire, Benin, Zimbabwe, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, and
Niger are in the last quintile (the bottom 25) in all three main indices
(GII, Input, and Output).
All in all, the top 10 countries in the GII 2001 edition are dominated by
Europe with six countries, and include two Asian economies and two North
American countries: Switzerland, Sweden, Singapore, Hong Kong (SAR, China),
Finland, Denmark, the United States of America (US), Canada, the
Netherlands, and the United Kingdom (UK). Leaders in their respective
regions are Switzerland (1st), Singapore (3rd), the US (7th), Israel (14th),
Chile (38th), Mauritius (53rd), and India (62nd). By income group, from
high- to low-income countries, the leaders are Switzerland (1st), Malaysia
(31st), China (29th), and Ghana (70th).
The top 10 countries in the Innovation Output Sub-Index are Sweden,
Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, the US, Finland, Denmark, Israel, the
UK, and Canada. The best-ranked economies within each region are Sweden
(1st), the US (5th), Israel (8th), the Republic of Korea (11th), Brazil
(32nd), India (44th), and Nigeria (62nd).
To download the full report or see additional highlights, please visit:
http://www.insead.edu/elab.
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