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УДК 316.422 : 378 : 338.24
DRUK Valiantsina, PhD in Econ. Sc., Associate Professor, Associate Professor of the Department of Economics and Business1
VERICH Anna
Postgraduate Student of the Department of Economics and Business1 1Polessky State University, Pinsk, Republic of Belarus
Received 11 October 2024
THE TRIAD «EDUCATION-SCIENCE-INNOVATION»: INDICATORS AND CHALLENGES FOR BELARUS1
Objective - to analyze the trends in the development of higher education in the context of its interaction with scientific-innovation activity, as well as in the identification of regularities and stable relations of the triad "education-science-innovation" in the context of their impact on the economic security of the country.
Materials and methods. The study was carried out on the basis of statistical data characterizing the spheres of «education» and «science and innovation». General (analysis, observation, measurement, comparison) and special (statistical-economic, data visualization) methods of scientific research were applied.
Results. The article analyzes the dynamics of specific indicators characterizing the innovation potential of education and science for the period 2016-2023, studies the performance of innovation activity of the national economy. It is concluded that the identified negative trends (decrease in the share of the higher education sector in R&D, low share of education expenditures in the total amount of budget expenditures, decrease in the share ofpersons who graduated from postgraduate education with the defense of a thesis for the degree of candidate or doctor of sciences, steady decrease in the number of students in the total population, decrease in the inventive and patent activity of national applicants) can significantly limit the potential of the education system in the field of innovation and scientific development of the national economy. It is stated that the establishment of patterns that determine the successful interaction between education, science and innovation will allow to create a model that promotes a more effective exchange of knowledge and resources.
Conclusion. The research is aimed at creating an effective strategy of interaction between education, science and innovation, which will have a positive impact on innovation activity and, ultimately, will co n-tribute to sustainable economic growth and increase the competitiveness of the country. Thus, the results of the study will allow not only to identify sustainable interrelationships in the triad "education -science-innovation", but also to develop practical recommendations that will help to create a harmonious ecosy stem for innovative development.
Keywords: innovation, education, scientific activity, economic competitiveness, innovation policy.
В.Ю. ДРУК, канд. экон. наук, доцент, доцент кафедры экономики и бизнеса1
А.И. ВЕРИЧ, аспирант кафедры экономики и бизнеса1
1Полесский государственный университет, г. Пинск, Республика Беларусь
ТРИАДА «ОБРАЗОВАНИЕ-НАУКА-ИННОВАЦИИ»: ИНДИКАТОРЫ И ВЫЗОВЫ ДЛЯ БЕЛАРУСИ
1 Статья публикуется в авторской редакции.
Цель исследования - анализ тенденций развития сферы высшего образования в контексте его взаимодействия с научно-инновационной деятельностью, а также в выявлении закономерностей и устойчивых связей триады «образование-наука-инновации» в контексте их влияния на экономическую безопасность страны.
Материалы и методы. Исследование проведено на основе статистических данных, характеризующих отрасли «образование», «наука и инновации». Применены общие (анализ, наблюдение, измерение, сопоставление) и специальные (статистико-экономический, визуализация данных) методы научного исследования.
Результаты. В статье проанализирована динамика отдельных показателей, характеризующих инновационный потенциал образования и науки за период 2016-2023 года, изучена результативность инновационной деятельности национальной экономики. Сделан вывод о том, что выявленные негативные тенденции (снижение доли сектора высшего образования в НИОКР, низкий удельный вес расходов на образование в общей сумме расходов бюджета, сокращение доли лиц, окончивших последипломного образования с защитой диссертации на соискание степени кандидата или доктора наук, устойчивое снижение числа студентов в общей численности населения, снижение изобретательской и патентной активности национальных заявителей) могут существенно ограничить потенциал системы образования в области инноваций и научного р азвития. Определено, что установление закономерностей, которые определяют успешное взаимодействие между образованием, наукой и инновациями, позволит создать модель, способствующую более эффективному обмену знаниями и ресурсами.
Заключение. Исследование направлено на создание эффективной стратегии взаимодействия образования, науки и инноваций, что положительно скажется на инновационной активности и, в конечном итоге, будет способствовать устойчивому экономическому росту и повышению конкурентоспособности страны.Таким образом, результаты исследования позволят не только выявить устойчивые взаимосвязи в триаде «образование-наука-инновации», но и разработать практические рекомендации, которые помогут создать гармоничную экосистему для инновационного развития.
Ключевые слова: инновации, образование, научная деятельность, конкурентоспособность экономики, инновационная политика.
Introduction. The transition of the national economy to the post-industrial stage of development, the increasing role of human and, in particular, intellectual capital, innovation activity of all subjects of the market economy requires a re-evaluation of both the process of educational activity itself and the interaction, or, more precisely, the merger of the sphere of education, science and innovation. Science can no longer be perceived as an elitist and isolated from mass education.
Scientific research should be integrated into the educational process, starting from the first years of higher education. Only in this case it is possible to form the necessary critical mass of educated and research-minded specialists, who will be receptive to innovations and will have the necessary competencies for their implementation.
The role of interaction within the tria d "education-science-innovation" is manifested in the following:
- research-based innovation can become a powerful driver of economic development, with quality education providing people with skills that meet the requirements of the modern market;
- research can have an impact on pressing social issues such as health, environment and technology, while education helps people to become more knowledgeable and engaged in these processes;
- countries that actively develop this triad become more globally competitive, as investment in science and education provides technological leadership and sustainable development;
- creating sustainable links between educational institutions, research centers and businesses fosters an ecosystem where ideas can be quickly transformed into practical solutions that contribute to the development of new technologies and services.
These aspects emphasize the importance of the triad "education-science-innovation" for the
state and society as a whole, creating a foundation for future progress.
The relevance of the research topic for the national economy is confirmed by the provisions fixed in the documents of strategic development of the Republic of Belarus: the National Strategy of Sustainable Socio-Economic Development of the Republic of Belarus for the period until 2035
[1], the Program of Socio-Economic Development of the Republic of Belarus for 2021 -2025
[2], the State Program «Of Innovative Development of the Republic of Belarus for 2021-2025»
[3], the State Program «Science-intensive Technologies and Engineering for 2021-2025» [4].
Main part. Proceeding from the thesis that the key factor in ensuring economic security of the national economy is innovation, we study the innovation component of the triad "education-science-innovation" as applied to the economy of the Republic of Belarus [5].
The Global Innovation Index (GII), published by World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) together with Cornell University and The Business School for The World INSEAD [6], is a comprehensive indicator characterizing the state of the innovation sphere. It is an important tool for assessing the innovation potential and performance of countries around the world.
The use of GII as a key indicator is justified by the fact that it:
- measures the innovative capacity and results of innovative development of most countries in the world (more than 130 countries are evaluated);
- allows comparing countries by the level of innovative development, as standardized indicators are used for assessment (more than 80 indicators are used and development institutions, human capital, innovation infrastructure, level of business development, scientific results, creativity of national researchers and results of creative activity are assessed);
- is a universal analytical tool as it provides detailed statistics on innovation ecosystems and helps to identify the strengths and weaknesses of countries' innovation policies;
- stimulates the development of countries by motivating governments to improve the conditions for innovation, and promotes a transparent competitive environment for technological development.
The index helps countries understand their innovation potential and design development strategies. The position of the Republic of Belarus in the GII is presented in table 1.
The position of the Republic of Belarus in the Global Innovation Index (GII) shows a downward trend, which raises certain concerns about the country's innovation activity and competitiveness in international markets. A particularly sharp drop is observed in 2022 and 2024, which can be attributed to various internal and external economic reasons, including changes in the educational and scientific environment, economic sanctions and other challenges.
Interestingly, while the country's overall index position is deteriorating, the rate of decline in terms of practical innovation performance remains moderate. This may indicate that there are still some achievements in innovation and certain sectors continue to develop despite the overall negative trends.
However, the most worrying factor is the drop in the indicators of access to resources and conditions for innovation activities. This can be attributed to funding constraints, low levels of investment in R&D, and a decline in the number of innovation-oriented personnel and firms.
To better understand the challenges of innovation development, let us compare the position of the Belarusian economy with that of its closest partner countries, members of the Eurasian Economic Union (table 2).
Year Gill position Innovation Inputs Innovation Outputs
2020 64 67 61
2021 62 68 62
2022 77 86 63
2023 80 88 66
2024 85 102 69
Source: [6]
Table 1. - The Republic of Belarus in the Global Innovation Index
Table 2. - Members of the Eurasian Economic Union in GII in 2024
Indicators Belarus Kyrgyzstan Kazakhstan Armenia Russia
Gill position 85 99 78 63 59
Innovation Inputs 102 79 72 86 76
1. Institutions 132 119 75 77 126
2. Human capital and research 43 42 65 89 36
3. Infrastructure 87 78 68 79 76
4. Market sophistication 98 81 86 83 57
5. Business sophistication 81 117 66 85 53
Innovation Outputs 69 55 83 105 56
6. Knowledge and technology outputs 46 107 85 60 52
7. Creative outputs 92 104 83 46 53
Source: [6]
Comparing the data on Belarus' partner countries, it can be noted that the resource indicators in all countries of the Eurasian Economic Union are significantly higher than in the Republic of Belarus. At the same time, in terms of innovation performance in general, Belarus is behind only Russia and Kyrgyzstan, while in terms of knowledge economy development Belarus is ahead of its EEU partners. Thus, Belarus produces more innovative products relative to the level of investment in innovation. In order to find out the reasons for this state of the innovation environment, it is useful to analyze the national education and science indicators.
First of all, let us consider the financing of innovations in the industrial sector and analyze the activity of enterprises in terms of expenditures on innovation activities (fig.).
As follows from Figure, the share of industrial enterprises that spend on innovation is steadily growing throughout the analyzed period. At the same time, starting from 2020, the growth rate has slowed down significantly. Meanwhile, it should be noted that the share of such organizations remains insufficiently high and amounts to less than 30% of the total number of economic entities.
The quantitative indicator of innovation costs does not have a stable trend: while there was growth until 2020, the most significant in 2017, by 2022 the volume of investment costs sharply decreased and practically returned to the initial level, and taking into account inflation we can talk about the "point of minimum innovation costs" in 2022.
2023 1279,5 2023 28,3
2022 816,6 2022 27,8
2021 1159 2021 27,5
2020 1473,6 2020 27,1
2019 1408,4 2019 25,5
2018 1139,5 2018 24,5
2017 1229,1 2017 22,5
2016 774,6 2016 21,7
0 500 1000 1500 2000 0 10 20 30
Figure - Indicators characterizing investment in innovation in industry in the Republic of Belarus
in 2016-2023
innovation expenditures of industrial organizations in current prices in the Republic of Belarus as a whole in 20192023, million rubles
2 share of industrial organizations that incurred innovation costs in the total number of surveyed industrial organiz a-tions in the Republic of Belarus, per cent Source: [7]
Assessing the economic environment (according to the EIS-2023 data) we note that in the whole country the share of organizations making expenditures on innovation is even lower and amounts to only 20.4% (the peak was reached in 2019 - 21.1%) [7].
Another problematic aspect from the position of resource potential is the low level of innovation activity of small and medium-sized enterprises (participating in joint innovation projects), the share of which is only 0.68% in 2023 and this is the most significant indicator since 2016 [7]. Innovation activity is determined not only by the financing of innovation, the level of financing and scientific potential of the country are also important. The indicators characterizing the "science" sector are presented in table 3.
In the dynamics of the indicators presented in Table 3, a certain regularity can be noted: most of them had an upward trend up to 2020, and then the trend reversed. This is not only a factor that negatively affected the country's position in the GII, but also laid down negative trends for the future, as the reduction of the innovative potential of science inevitably leads to a decline in innovation activity in all spheres of the national economy.
Table 3. - Specific indicators characterizing the innovation potential of science in 2016-2023.
Indicators 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
Share of R&D expenditures in GDP, per cent 0,50 0,58 0,60 0,59 0,54 0,46 0,47 0,58
including the share of public sector expenditures 0,17 0,19 0,19 0,20 0,20 0,16 0,17 0,18
Number of researchers per 1 million inhabitants 1776 1799 1877 1897 1477 1439 1430 1499
Number of organizations performing R&D, units 431 454 455 460 451 445 448 462
Listed number of employees performing scientific research and development, persons 25942 26483 27411 27735 25622 25644 25233 26738
of them have an academic degree doctor of sciences 631 646 627 608 560 550 523 519
PhD 2841 2884 2864 2833 2760 2659 2603 2724
Number of applications for inventions received, units 521 524 547 393 394 386 342 359
Including - domestic applicants 455 434 454 298 317 276 279 286
- foreign applicants 66 90 93 95 77 110 63 73
Inventive activity rate 0,5 0,5 0,5 0,4 0,4 0,4 0,4 0,4
Share of budget financing of domestic R&D expenditures, per cent 44,0 41,8 40,8 44,2 44,5 41,9 43,1 42,0
Share of employment in science-intensive activities, per cent 32,26 35,26 35,41 36,04 36,35 35,22 35,29 35,47
IVllOl V V Uvll V lllv J^ pvi Will
Source: [7], [8]
At the same time, there are indicators, the negative trend of development of which is still in place. For example, the share of budget financing of domestic R&D expenditures is falling, and the inventive and patent activity of national applicants is decreasing.
It is important to analyze the innovation potential of science in relation to the development of the "education" sector, since education and science interact to train qualified personnel who can both create new knowledge and put it into practice. Innovations appear at the intersection of theory and practice, which enhances the effectiveness of the educational process. Specific indicators of the "education" sector characterizing its innovation potential are presented in table 4.
Negative trends in the development of innovation capacity in education are manifested as follows:
- decrease in the share of the higher education sector in R&D: In 2023, this indicator amounted to only 9.3%, which is the worst value for the entire period under study. This indicates a declining interest in research within higher education institutions;
Table 4. - Specific indicators, characterizing the scientific and innovation potential of education in 2016-2023
Indicators 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
Share of higher education sector in domestic R&D expenditure, per cent 9,6 9,4 9,6 10,1 10,0 10,1 11,0 9,3
Share of education expenditures in total budget expenditures, percent1 13,6 13,0 13,3 13,1 12,9 12,4 12,8 3
Public expenditure on education, as a percentage of GDP1 4,9 4,8 5,4 5,0 4,9 4,6 4,6 5,0
The share of postgraduates with a thesis defense in the total number of postgraduate students, per cent 7,1 9,1 10,7 10,2 8,4 6,3 8,4 5,7
The share of persons who graduated from doctoral studies with thesis defense in the total graduation from doctoral studies, per cent 7,5 26,7 8,7 13,8 13,5 8,3 10,7 6,7
The share of population aged 25-34 with completed higher education, per cent 29,82 29,82 29,82 29,82 40,8 40,8 40,8 40,8
Number of students per 10,000 people 343 317 300 290 282 276 259 254
Graduation rate of specialists with a higher education diploma from higher education institutions of the Republic of Belarus, per cent 3 3 3 65,8 63,7 63,5 63,9 53,7
Notes -
1 according to the World Bank: open data. Access mode: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SE.XPD.TOTL.GB.ZS?locations=BY
2 according to 2009 census data 3... no data
Source: [7], [9]
- the share of education expenditures in total budget expenditures has also fallen to a critical minimum of less than 13%. which jeopardizes the quality and accessibility of education;
- the share of persons who graduated from postgraduate and doctoral programs with thesis defense in the total output at the level of postgraduate education has also reached a critical minimum -.5.7% in postgraduate programs and 6.7% in doctoral programs in 2023, these figures indicate a serious problem with the training of scientific personnel;
- the number of students per 10 thousand people continues to decline steadily, and in 2023 this figure is 254, which corresponds to the level of the 1990s. This indicates that the education system does not attract a sufficient number of students who could later become innovation-active specialists.
These negative trends may significantly limit the potential of the education system for innovation and scientific development.
The data in Table 5 indicate positive dynamics of the actual results of innovation activity,
which is largely explained by the existence of a time gap between investments in the resource component and their return. This means that the positive trends observed in the period from 2016 to 2020 contributed to an increase in the qualitative indicators characterizing innovation performance in the following years.
Data from the Global Innovation Index (GII) also confirm this: the practical results of innovation implementation were significantly higher than the resources spent in the period from 2022 to 2024.
Consequently, it is necessary to overcome the negative trends in the resource component of innovation after 2020. This could increase the efficiency of innovation in the country and strengthen the position of Belarus in the Global Innovation Index.
Conclusion. Thus, the analysis suggests that Belarus shows positive results in certain aspects of economic and innovation development compared to other neighboring countries.
Table 5. - Specific indicators, characterizing innovation efficiency in 2016-2023
Indicators 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023
Share of shipped innovative products in the total volume of shipments of industrial enterprises, per cent 16,3 17,4 18,6 16,6 17,9 19,8 17,7 22,2
Structure of shipped innovative products: - share of new products for the domestic market 43,5 49,1 55,2 45,2 48,2 52,8 49,0 55,8
- share of new products for the world market 0,5 0,5 1,2 1,6 0,5 0,6 0,6 0,8
Share of exports of science-intensive services in total exports of services, per cent 34,9 36,9 42,6 47,5 52,3 54,6 49,7 48,5
Source: [7]
The elimination of existing imbalances and a more efficient use of available resources and competencies can contribute to the country's further development. The Global Innovation Index can serve as a tool for diagnosing innovation potential, identifying areas for improvement in the innovation environment and developing public innovation policies. Its indicators are not only used in international comparisons, but are also used to assess the effectiveness of the national innovation ecosystem.
Innovations resulting from scientific research can indeed become a key driver of economic growth. Quality education plays a crucial role in this process, providing people with the necessary skills to meet the demands of today's labor market. Scientific research not only contributes to the creation of new technologies, but also helps to tackle pressing social issues such as sustainable development.
In addition, education raises awareness and engagement of citizens in processes related to scientific advances and innovation, which is important for creating an active and informed society. Establishing strong links between educational institutions, research centers and businesses helps to create an innovation ecosystem where ideas can be quickly transformed into practical solutions. This, in turn, stimulates the development of new technologies and services, which is highly relevant in a rapidly changing global economy.
Thus, the realization of the integration of education, science and business creates conditions for improving the competitiveness and sustainable development of both individual regions and the country as a whole.
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Статья поступила 11 октября 2024 г.
