Federal Minister for Planning, Development and Reform Prof Ahsan Iqbal has expressed great concern over Pakistan being ranked as least efficient innovator.
He said: “In knowledge economy era, creativity and innovation are fundamental drivers of progress and prosperity and no country can afford to ignore innovation. Pakistan Vision 2025 aims at building new innovation foundations in economy for competitiveness. We are living in a very competitive world and being categorised as least efficient innovator is a very serious challenge which requires extra ordinary effort. The government has earmarked highest ever budget for higher education and scientific development geared towards strengthening academia and industry links. The government, private sector and academia partnership is being promoted to bring synergy in the efforts to transform the economy into a knowledge economy. Modern and complex economic challenges demand that nations pursue economic agendas with clarity and unity.”
A new ‘Creative Productivity Index’ (CPI) developed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Economic Intelligence Unit (EIU) has ranked Pakistan as the least efficient innovator. Pakistan is ranked 23rd with weaknesses in fostering a competitive business environment and it provides little incentive for firms to innovate, says the report.
According to the index, Myanmar and Cambodia have also been ranked as the least efficient innovators, while Japan and South Korea have been ranked as countries most efficient in the Asia and Pacific region at turning creative inputs into tangible innovation. Of those with lower creative inputs, Pakistan and Cambodia are less efficient at turning inputs into outputs.
The index uses 36 input indicators to measure the capacity and incentives for innovation, including how many global top 500 universities a country has, the urbanisation rate, spending on research and development, protection of intellectual property rights, and corruption and bureaucracy.
The eight output indicators to measure innovation include the number of patents filed, export sophistication, value added to agriculture, and the number of books and films produced. The CPI aims to give policymakers a unique tool to measure progress in fostering creativity and innovation in 22 Asian economies along with the United States and Finland for comparison purposes. It measures the innovative and creative capacity of economies by relating creative inputs to outputs.
On the input side, creative productivity is measured on three dimensions: the capacity to innovate, incentives to innovate and how conducive the environment is to innovation. The output side measures innovations by considering both conventional indicators, such as the number of patents filed, as well as a broader set of measures of knowledge creation.
On innovation inputs alone, Singapore topped the rankings with strong political institutions, protection of intellectual property, and contract enforcement. Among Asian countries, Hong Kong, China topped the list in terms of innovation outputs due to a high level of export sophistication and its prolific film production industry.
Salute you guys from all political parties….this is what democracy per your present system has given us this trophy. Thank you. Many experts have pointed out following contradiction in the vision 2025 vis-à-vis PSDP or federal budget:
– Social development is first pillar, while it is last in PSDP document, while infrastructure development is the last pillar of the vision but 1st priority in the PSDP
– how does Mr Iqbal envisages to build knowledge based economy when the share of education including that of HEC in the PSDP has gone down from 6% in 2013-14 to 5% in 2014-15
– Science & Tech has also witnessed a reduction of share in PSDP from 2% to 1%, whereas growth projections in the vision are dependent upon improved productivity & moving to high value addition( this line is very open ended ).
– Governance is important pillar in vision 2025, but its share is also halved from 2% to 1% in the PSDP.
The scheme also talk of water security( read dams, provision of drinking water , every aspect of water related works etc; ), but its share for such works has been drastically reduced from 14% to 9% in the PSDP.
– The export target in the vision 2025 was envisaged at $150 billion, while ground realities show that Pakistan has recorded its lowest ever exports in the last qrtr during 4 yrs in FY14.
– during the 1st 3 qrtrs of the yr, exports grew by 3% but during the last qrtr the exports recorded -2.3% growth. In addition the exchange rate appreciation in the last qrtr cost the country millions of dollars in export.
– In recent yrs, Pakistan jewelry exports have witnessed a tremendous growth, but declined to just $ 324 million as against $1.2 billion a yr earlier, thereby losing $ 854 million worth of exports, thus touching their lowest point in the last 6 yrs. Much of this can be attributed to the ban of gold import.
– The experts believe that faulty exchange rate management has cost the country dearly as the benefits of GSP + were totally marginalized by exchange rate obsession.
So, Mr Iqbal were do we stand today ?
Democracy is present form will keep us from growing up, till we get rid of " kleptocracy & oligarchical " system….
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