Greece Performing ‘Below Expectations’ on Innovation

Athens, Greece. Photo Source: Visit Greece /Y Skoulas

Greece ranks 47th on a list of 132 of the world’s most innovative countries, performing “below expectations”, according to the Global Innovation Index (GII) recently published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

Relative to GDP, Greece’s performance is below expectations for its level of development, the GII notes.

The bubble chart below shows the relationship between income levels (GDP per capita) and innovation performance (GII score). The trend line gives an indication of the expected innovation performance according to income level. Economies appearing above the trend line are performing better than expected and those below are performing below expectations.

Source: Global Innovation Index 2021

Despite its low performance, Greece has gained four positions compared to 2020 on the GII and six since 2019.

Source: Global Innovation Index 2021

According to the data available, Greece performs better in innovation inputs than innovation outputs in 2021:
– This year Greece ranks 39th in innovation inputs, higher than both 2020 and 2019
– As for innovation outputs, Greece ranks 60th. This position is lower than both 2020 and 2019.

Meanwhile, Greece ranks 39th among the 51 high-income group economies and 30th among the 39 economies in Europe.

Greece’s GII pillar scores

An overview of the rankings in the seven GII pillars for 2021 shows that Greece performs above the high-income group average in human capital and research.

Its weakest performance is in market sophistication.

Source: Global Innovation Index 2021

The GII 2021 innovation leaders

The Global Innovation Index (GII) ranks world economies according to their innovation capabilities. Consisting of roughly 80 indicators grouped into innovation inputs and outputs, the GII aims to capture the multi-dimensional facets of innovation.

Switzerland, Sweden, US, and the UK continue to lead the innovation ranking, and have all ranked in the top 5 in the past three years.

The Republic of Korea joins the top 5 of the GII for the first time in 2021, while four other Asian economies feature in the top 15: Singapore (8th), China (12th), Japan (13th) and Hong Kong (14th).

Source: Global Innovation Index 2021

Europe 2nd most innovative region

Europe is the second most innovative region in the world after the US and Canada.

A total of 10 economies have moved up the ranks this year. Among them are France (11th), Iceland (17th), Austria (18th), Estonia (21st), Hungary (34th) and Bulgaria (35th).

Economies performing below expectations

According to the Index, 31 economies are performing below expectations on innovation. In the high-income group, three are European Union economies – Greece, Lithuania and Romania.

In the upper middle-income group, there are two Latin American and Caribbean economies – Argentina and the Dominican Republic.

In the lower middle-income group, 11 economies are performing below expectations for their level of development, notably five from sub-Saharan Africa – Angola, Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Cameroon and Nigeria.

The GII index is published by the WIPO in partnership with the Portulans Institute and its corporate partners: The Brazilian National Confederation of Industry (CNI), the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), the Ecopetrol (Colombia) and the Turkish Exporters Assembly (TIM).