Nakłady na działalność badawczo-rozwojową a innowacyjność polskiej gospodarki
R&D Expenditures and the Innovativeness of the Polish Economy

Summary/Abstract: With the adoption of the Lisbon Strategy of 2000, Poland faced an ambitious task of stimulating research and development activities, which are undoubtedly the base of any innovative and competitive economy. The assumptions of the Lisbon Strategy, which were to be carried out by 2010, appeared to be too ambitious for Poland, as well as most other EU states. Now, with the adoption of the new Europe 2020 strategy, Poland once again faces a great challenge: by 2020 it has to demonstrate intelligent development, i.e. one founded on knowledge and innovations. The aim of the article is to analyze and to assess R&D activities in Poland in comparison with EU-27 states in the years 2004–2010, and their impact on the innovativeness of their economies. The assumption is that the structure of R&D expenditures and the complementarity of research centers and private enterprise have a decisive influence on the level of an economy’s innovativeness. The analysis presented in the article indicates that the financing structure of R&D expenditures in Poland is just the opposite to the pattern revealed by the highly developed countries and recommended by the European Commission. It is a structure which supports incremental rather than radical innovations. The analysis, based on the available data on R&D effort, illustrates the position of Polish economy among the EU states, and highlight both positive and negative tendencies that appeared in the period covered by the analysis.

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