Paper: GS – III, Subject: Economy/Science and Technology, Topic: Economic Development, Issue: India’s contribution of GDP to R&D.
Context:
India’s ambition for Viksit Bharat hinges on bridging its chronic R&D deficit 0.7% of GDP vs. global leaders’ 3-5% – despite 17.5% of world population producing just 3% research, hampering tech sovereignty amid Huawei’s solo outspend.
Key Highlights:
The Scale in Numbers
- Research Output Disparity: Despite having 17.5% of the world’s population, India produces only 3% of the world’s research output.
- Patent Filings: India ranked sixth globally for total patent filings in 2023, recording 64,480 applications, representing approximately 1.8% of the global total.
- Resident Applications per Million Inhabitants: India ranks significantly lower (47th), underscoring that the overall growth is not yet translating into widespread, population-level innovation dominance.
- R&D Expenditure: Gross Expenditure on R&D in India has consistently hovered between 0.6% and 0.7% of GDP in recent years.
- Comparison with Other Economies: China spends around 2.4%, the United States is at approximately 3.5%, and Israel leads globally at over 5.4%.
- Comparison with a Single Multinational Corporation: In 2023, Huawei invested approximately $23.4 billion into R&D, exceeding the total combined R&D expenditure of all public and private entities in India.
The Path Forward:
- Increase R&D Expenditure: Raise the R&D expenditure to GDP ratio to at least 2% within the next five to seven years.
- Increase private sector share to 50% through tax incentives and grants.
- Shift from scattered research to national strategic missions.
- Focus on strategic national missions in frontier technologies. (AI, Quantum computing, Semiconductors, Green energy and Advanced materials)
- Reform universities into research-led centres of excellence.
- Strengthen PhD funding, faculty positions, and research infrastructure.
- Promote industry–academia collaboration via research chairs and incubation centres.
- Build a strong intellectual property and patent commercialization culture.
India has the capability and ambition to lead global innovation, but inadequate R&D investment weakens this goal. Strong structural, financial, and cultural reforms are essential, or Viksit Bharat will be delayed beyond 2047.
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