On Wednesday 27 May, the European Commission published its latest report on the EU's science, research and innovation performance.
In particular, the report notes that the EU lags behind the US and Japan in terms of innovation output, according to the European Commission's Innovation Output Indicator (IOI). "This is mainly due to its poor performance in patent applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty (the international patent system), reporting very slow progress in recent years", the report says.
The European Union now accounts for 20% of patent applications worldwide, compared to 30% in 2000. The share from the United States, the world leader in this area, has also fallen considerably.
Within the EU, Ireland is the best performer in this respect, followed by Sweden and Luxembourg. Greece, on the other hand, is at the bottom of the index, followed by Lithuania and Romania.
However, the Commission points out that the EU is the world leader in patent applications in the fields of climate and the bio-economy. In these two fields, it also accounts for 25% (climate) and 27% (bio-economy) of the most cited scientific publications.
In its report, the Commission also underlines "the importance of ensuring that Europeans have the right skills, in the light of new technological revolutions" and affirms "the significant role of R&I policy", in particular to increase business productivity and create jobs (see other news).
To view the report: https://bit.ly/2X7NzXE (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki)