Business Investment in R&D Shows a Steady but Slow Increase. (August 28, 2008)

    The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) today published figures showing Australian business expenditure on R&D (BERD) grew for the 6th year in a row.

The President of the Federation of Australian Scientific and Technological Societies (FASTS), Professor Tom Spurling said the sustained improvement in BERD is a welcome and positive sign. He pointed out, 'The main increases were in large firms (over 200 employees) and the mining sector. He went on to say, "Business investment in R&D fell to a low low of 0.64% of GDP in 1999-2000 but has increased each year since to 0.95% of GDP in the latest ABS figures."

Nevertheless he said, "[T]his figure remains significantly lower than the 1.53% OECD average," and he continued, "Over the past few years there has been a persistent effort by Government and, more recently, the Business Council of Australia to explain away Australia's poor level of BERD by beating up the relative value of innovation that is not based on science and technology. However undervaluing formal R&D is misguided as in-house R&D capability is critical for evaluating and tapping into external knowledge sources such as universities, CSIRO or other firms. The mistake is to see BERD as simply being about ‘widgit-to-market; [but] smart firms invest in BERD to get direct commercial outcomes and also to identify and manage risks to their net worth."