Should come as no surprise: India. No matter how great we think the Indian economy is doing, we suck when it comes to innovation.
Check the Bloomberg Innovation Index. It lists top 50 countries on Innovation. And the BRIC rankings are
RUSSIA – 14
CHINA – 22
BRAZIL – 47
INDIA – NOT THERE
Similarly, there is something called Global Innovation Index, done by Insead etc, sponsored by Wipro, and Indian company. Let’s check the rankings here:
CHINA – 39
RUSSIA – 49
BRAZIL – 61
INDIA – 76
While there maybe slight differences in rankings between the two surveys, one thing is clear – India is not in the top 50.
And guess which countries are above and below us in GII. Ranked 75 is the runt of a country called Oman; and at 77 we have Lebanon, which has suffered from civil war for decades. Even now, several countries have an advisory out telling their citizens not to travel to Lebanon for any reason whatsoever!
In India’s defence, one could say that innovation is highly linked to per capital GDP. It appears poor countries are poor because they don’t know how to innovate. The GII reports points out that compared to its per capita GDP, India is going well. It seems we are doing better than countries as poor as us. Don’t know if that should be a cause for comfort. Sitting next to Lebanon certainly doesn’t do it.
India on Global Innovation Index
