By BERNIE CAHILES-MAGKILAT
The Philippines ranked 50th in Global Innovation Index (GII) 2020, its best rank ever, among 131 countries surveyed.
This year's GII, co-published by Cornell University, INSEAD, and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), showed the Philippines rose 4 notches higher than its 2019 ranking at 54th. The Philippines ranked 73rd in 2018 and 100th in 2014.
The Philippines scored high in all the seven innovation GII pillars – institutions, creative outputs, knowledge and technology outputs, business sophistication, creative inputs, infrastructure, market sophistication, and human capital and research.
Among the 7 GII pillars, the Philippines performed best in knowledge and technology outputs.
The country ranked 41st in terms of innovation outputs from 42nd in 2019 and 68th in 2018. Also, this year, the Philippines jumped to rank 70th in innovation inputs from 76th in 2019 and 82nd in 2018.
Specifically, its strengths lie on knowledge absorption (7), knowledge and tech outputs (26), UMS by origin (8), knowledge diffusion (8).
Its weaknesses are in education (114), expenditure on education (106), GERD (percentage of expenditure on R&D) financed by abroad (91) and scientific and technical articles (125).
The Philippines also ranked 4th among the 29 lower middle-income group economies.
Notably, the country ranked 11th among 17th economies in South East Asia, East Asia, and Oceania.
Together with other economies China, India and Vietnam, the Philippines has made the most significant progress in the GII innovation ranking over time.
It also stands out for the innovativeness of its business sector.
The Philippines produce d more innovation outputs relative to its level of innovation investments. It is an efficient innovator. It was also ranked higher at 19th on e-commerce.
The Philippines is also well integrated into global trade, ranking first in high-technology imports, 3rd in high technology exports, 8th in ICT services exports and 10th in Creative goods exports.
Among its highest-ranking indicators, productivity growth ranked 6th, Firms offering formal training 7th, and Utility models by origin ranked 8th globally.
Its innovation profile also topped 25 rankings for indicators such as graduates in science and engineering, Market capitalization, Research talent in business enterprises and High-technology manufacturing.
Science and Technology Secretary Fortunato T. de la Peña, who unveiled the latest GII 2020 at the Metro Manila Area Business Conference of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, cited the inclusion in the report of an article Chapter 8 with the title, “Filipinnovation: Financing Science for the People”.
In that particular chapter, Secretary de la Peña enumerated the different R&D projects under the Science for Change Program and other flagship programs being implemented with primary focus on funding grassroots innovation; promoting regional capacity building; fostering symbiotic collaboration between the academe and R&D institutes and industry stakeholders; and strengthening knowledge transfer and technical assistance to micro, small, and medium enterprises.
The innovation initiatives particularly of the DOST will prove futile if not fully backed up by legislation, thus the enactment of Republic Act (RA) No. 11293, or better known as the “Philippine Innovation Act” helped put muscle to the country’s innovation agenda.
The law was passed with the aim of boosting the Philippines’ global competitiveness by harnessing the power of science, technology, and innovation.
It also paved the way for the establishment of the National Innovation Council (NIC) that works on a whole-of-government approach involving the coordination and collaboration of the different agencies of government to greatly improve the country’s innovation governance and create synergy.
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