NITI Aayog member V.K. Saraswat on Thursday underscored the need for increasing the research and development spend in the country, from the existing level of sub-1% of GDP, for boosting innovation and creating more intellectual property rights.
“India’s investment on research and development has to go up from today’s 0.7-0.8% to something like 2% of the GDP. Only then we can see a substantial increase in our innovation, IP and economic growth,” he said on the sidelines of a conference at the Indian School of Business (ISB) here.
IPR, innovation and competition are main factors responsible for economic growth.
Balance between IP and competition will certainly foster more innovation, Mr. Saraswat said in response to media queries.
Earlier, delivering a key note address at the 2nd India Conference on ‘Innovation, Intellectual Property and Competition,’ he said every country has realised innovation is fundamental to economic well being and is finding new ways of doing this advanced work. India also has taken a similar approach through a number of platforms such as research parks, incubation centres and schemes like Atal Innovation Mission.
The push this government has given to innovation system is unprecedented and reflected in the number of steps India has jumped in Innovation Index, he said. Some may argue in favour of frugal innovation and ‘jugaad’, but in the long run a strong R&D base is what will matter, he said, while pointing out that micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) in particular and industries in general lack such a strong base.
“That is why the number of innovations coming from them is less than those from academic institutions, national laboratories,” as the latter have a better eco-system for R&D. MSME innovation is limited and once innovation is not there IPs will be limited, he said.
A release from ISB said the two-day conference sought to bring together scholars, practitioner and policymakers to discuss the implications of innovation and intellectual property for business strategy, competition and social welfare. ISB Dean Rajendra Srivastava said to strengthen the innovation ecosystem in India there is a need to focus not only on Make in India but also Design in India and Invent in India.