Dusan Vujovic, Chairman of the Scientific Council of NALED - Both the state and the private sector need to invest more in research and development

- More resources and a smart selection of priorities in the field of innovation are required, in order for 12,000 researchers in 70 institutes and a large number of innovation centers to give the expected effect on productivity growth in production and in the society as a whole. This is the key to long-term sustainable growth and the achievement of developed countries in income and standard of living. It is also important to increase investments in research and development, but also to encourage cooperation between science and economy. NALED's analysis showed that financing innovation is one of the first obstacles, because even among innovative companies, two thirds of them do not have a budget for research and development at all. Furthermore, in order for innovation to be sustainable, one must protect it. Only two percent of our companies have applied for a patent, and the number of 50 patents filed per million inhabitants in Serbia is nearly five times lower than the EU average. That is why we must constantly educate all of the actors in the innovation ecosystem about the importance of intellectual property and its protection. On the examples of Finland, Israel and Singapore as innovation leaders, we see just how important it is for the development of the innovation ecosystem to invest in education, especially in teaching staff and to provide a greater autonomy for educational institutions.

What additional changes can help better place our country at the international level in terms of innovation?

- On the global lists of innovative economies, Serbia is currently somewhere in the middle. It is ranked worst in the field of research, development and access to finance, and there is a lot of room for improvement there, especially in the field of university-business cooperation. Whereas in the European countries as many as 46% of researchers are employed in companies, here in Serbia only two percent of them are engaged in the business sector, and only three percent of our companies have made development in cooperation with the academic community. The recently published Gray Book of Innovations gives us very clear guidelines in that direction. In order to direct the work of scientific research institutions towards the needs of the economy, one of the recommendations is to modify the scoring system for the election to the title of researcher, so that all forms of cooperation with the business sector can be rewarded. The introduction of industrial doctorates has also been proposed, which means that the doctoral student will be employed by the company for which he is conducting research in parallel with his PhD studies.

The data also show that the participation of the private sector in the investments in research and development, is currently at a very low level in our country. How do we change this trend?

- Serbia lags far behind the European average in terms of investments in research and development, both at the level of budget investments (0.89% of GDP in 2019, whereas the EU average is 2.19%) and at the level of the private sector. Namely, the investment of private companies in research and development in our country amounts to merely 0.36% of GDP - a half of what the private sector invests in the new members of the European Union, and a quarter of investments in the entire EU. It is important to increase the awareness of businesspeople about the benefits of investing in research and development. For example, the analysis shows us that our companies that implemented innovations had twice the placement in EU and EFTA countries compared to those that did not. In Serbia, there is insufficient awareness among potential investors to direct their savings towards high-risk startups, despite the possibility of big profits. Therefore, one of the ideas is for the state to reduce the risk of investment through co-investment or guarantee schemes through the Innovation Activity Fund, as well the introduction of a tax credit for investment angels.

NALED Beograd

Philip Morris operations a.d. Niš

NALED

Philip Morris

Dusan Vujovic

Startech program

company funding

innovative products

entrepreneurship

digitization

investment angels

tax credit

industrial PhD

Gray Book of Innovations