SA’s spending on research and development (R&D) has dropped slightly in terms of GDP for the second year running.

Science and technology minister Naledi Pandor told journalists at parliament on Thursday that while R&D spending rose in nominal terms, from R18,6bn in 2007/08 to R21bn in 2008/09, gross spending as a percentage of GDP slipped from 0,93% to 0,92%.

“We are worried that this percentage of GDP, which is the most widely accepted indicator of competitiveness of a country’s economy, is not growing at the level that we wanted to,” Pandor said.

Her department has set an R&D target of 1% of GDP. The figures are contained in the 2008/09 National Survey of Research and Experimental Development, tabled by Pandor at the media briefing.

In terms of GDP, spending on R&D rose steadily from 1997 (0,60%) to a high in 2006 of 0,95%, but has dropped over the past two years.

The survey notes that “few OECD [the international Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development] countries have a GERD [gross expenditure on R&D] equivalent to less than 1% of GDP”.

A table in the document issued by the department shows spending by Sweden, Finland, Japan and the US on R&D exceeds 3% of GDP.

Pandor said R&D spending in SA needed to increase by R1,7bn to reach the 1% target.

The survey results would now be probed “to establish why we’re not meeting that 1% target and to look at where it is we may be falling behind”.

She said SA’s skills shortage was a “major problem” in this regard. Another key constraint was the low proportion of researchers in relation to the total employed population.

According to the survey, SA has 1,4 researchers per 1 000 workers, compared to China (1,9), Argentina (2,9), Australia (8,5) and Japan (11), among others.

Of the R21bn spent on R&D in 2008/09, the bulk — R12,3bn — was spent by business. In nominal terms, this was an increase of about 14,8% over the previous year. — Sapa