Romania second to last in the EU on GDP share allocated for research

In 2016 the EU member states allocated in average 2.03 percent of the GDP for research and development (R&D), while Romania and Latvia were on the last places on R&D allocation, respectively with 0.48 percent and 0.44 percent, according to the data published by Eurostat.

Two EU member states allocated for R&D more than 3 percent of GDP, Sweden (3.25 percent) and Austria (3.09 percent).

Overall, the EU member states spent over EUR 300 billion for R&D in 2016, but the GDP share for R&D remained stable compared with 2015. Compared with other big economies of the world, the GDP share allocated for research in EU is lower than South Korea (4.23 percent of the GDP in 2015), Japan (3.29 percent of the GDP in 2015) and USA (2.79 percent of the GDP in 2015).

However, during 2006-2016, the share of the GDP allocated for research in EU increased by 1.76 percent up to 2.03 percent, while in the case of Romania it basically remained unchanged, 0.45 percent of the GDP in 2006 and 0.48 percent of the GDP in 2016.

In almost all the EU member states, including Romania, the companies from the business sector are the main sector responsible for R&D expenses.