By Professor Tim Turpin and Dr Heather Spence
Associate Professor Tim Turpin is Director of the Centre for Policy Research at the University of Wollongong.
Dr Heather Spence is a Research Fellow and Manager of the STEPAN program at the Centre for Policy Research at the University of Wollongong.
Introduction
Industrial, social, economic and scientific development across the economies of the Asia Pacific region during the past decade has been dramatic. The annual real Gross National Product (GNP) growth among economies such as the Republic of Korea, Chinese Taipei, and Peoples Republic of China, averaged between 7.3 and 9.3% over the last decade, with growth in some regions of southern China exceeding 30% per annum. In 1994, the growth rate recorded for China was 11.4%, for Singapore 10.2% and for Malaysia 8.9%. Singapore, according to the 1994 World Competitiveness Report was rated the second most competitive economy in the world, trailing only the United States (Yeo, 1995).
Asia is however an increasingly inward focused market. Following a wave of Japanese direct investment in the region, there is a massive increase in the demand for capital goods through Eastern Asia. Exports from the Republic of Korea to Asia rose by two-thirds to $US5.1 billion in the two years to 1990; Asia has surpassed North America as Japan's largest market. Indonesia's exports to Japan of machinery and transport equipment, and miscellaneous manufactured goods, are currently rising at an astounding 325% pa and 153% pa respectively. China's Japan-oriented machinery and transport equipment exports are expanding by 115% pa and Thailand's miscellaneous manufactured goods exported to Japan by 116% pa. UNCTAD, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development observed in 1990 the consequent development of an informal Pacific Rim trading network that was emerging, based on Japan (UNCTAD, 1990). Since that time APEC, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, has contributed toward the development of regional cooperation in economic and trade related areas such as, human resource development, environmental management, investment and technology transfer.
APEC, established in 1989, presently includes 18 participating economies: Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, the People's Republic of China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, Thailand and the United States. Russia is currently negotiating membership. Within the forum, ten working groups contribute to regional dialogue and cooperation across a range of socio-economic activities. A growing emphasis within the APEC forum is on regional cooperation in the production of scientific knowledge, technological development and innovation. In 1995, science and technology ministers from participating APEC economies reaffirmed the role of the Industrial Science and Technology Working group (IST) as: facilitating improved flows of technological information, research exchanges , and joint joint research activities, improving transparency of of regulatory frameworks and contributing to sustainable development (APEC Secretariat, 1996).
While the economic face of Asia has changed dramatically through the 1990s, science and technology policy has become a major plank in the economic development strategies of almost all countries throughout the region. National governments, as significant funders of R&D, have been pressed to make strategic decisions about how they should distribute their share of the national science funding base. Such decisions involve determining the overall level of government funding, the distribution of funding across priority areas, assessing the national socio-economic benefits derived from research, and creating environments conducive to the production and application of scientific knowledge More recently, increasing the level of international science and technology collaboration has been a strategic objective underlying a whole range of national programs.
The Pacific Rim in the 1990s is now beginning to cohere around a regional economic identity in which science is a central feature of development strategy. Though expressed in different ways in different countries there is a general drive to turn public sector science towards the marketplace, and to look for future S&T growth and application within the business sector. Generally also, countries of the region are investing and planning for S&T in the long-term. Within this context however, the manner in which science policy is being realised is different in each national situation. Behind the extraordinary economic growth demonstrated by Japan, the Republic of Korea, Chinese Taipei and the variously described 'Asian Tigers', or 'Dynamic Asian Economies' as OECD calls them, there is not one Asia story, but a complex web of different science and technology stories, each reflecting differences in national culture, history and current development status. In the present paper we seek to show something of the drives and constraints that characterise science and technology policy across the APEC region. At the same time, however, we also illustrate the diversity that remains a key feature of development throughout the region.
National Investments in Science and Technology
Science and technology in the region is now far less dominated by the powerful economic position of Japan than it was during the 1980s. Although Japan continues to be the dominant spender sustained growth in R&D investment in many of the Asian newly industrialising countries has meant that their levels of expenditure on R&D (Gross Expenditures, GERD) per GDP are rapidly moving to the levels of investment experienced in OECD countries. In 1981 the two fastest growing economies, Chinese Taipei and the Republic of Korea, were spending well below the OECD average on GERD (approximately 1.38% of GDP). However, the countries recorded high real annual growth levels through the 1980s, so that by 1990 the Republic of Korea has moved up from 20th to 10th place in world rankings, and Chinese Taipei from 17th to 12th place. By 1994 Korea's GERD % of GDP was equal to the average of the total OECD countries' expenditure (see Table 1).
Meanwhile Singapore GERD has grown at a rate of 22% from a very low base of 0.28% of GDP in 1981 to 1.12% in 1994; Australia has increased its GERD from 1.00 in 1981 to 1.56% in 1994, and PR China's levels of R&D investment grew very strongly, particularly in the non-State enterprise sector, yielding a GERD/GDP ratio which is disguised in its significance by the radical shift in the enormous level of GDP growth that occurred in parallel. At the same time GERD/GDP expenditure in countries such as the United States, the United Kingdom, and Germany have steadily fallen since the late 1980s. As a consequence, of the medium level R&D performers, generally dominated by Sweden and Switzerland, the fastest growing R&D investing countries are now those from the Asia-Pacific region.
While some countries have higher levels of R&D investment, or proportions of GERD/GDP, there is considerable variation in the extent to which different sectors support the R&D effort. Mexico, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, for example, are particularly dependent on the higher education sector, whereas Korea is almost wholly dependent on the private sector. The situation in Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand reflects a less advanced industrial country status. All spend approximately 0.20% of GDP on R&D, all heavily supported by the government sector (see Table 2).
Table 1: Change in Gross Expenditure on R&D
Expressed as a % of GDP in Selected Economies
GERD GERD GERD
Economy % % %
GDP GDP GDP
1981 1991 1994
Japan 2.13 2.87 2.92
United States 2.43 2.73 2.67
South Korea 0.62 1.86 2.33
Chinese Taipei 0.93 1.69 1.82
Australia 1.00 1.34 1.56
Canada 1.44 1.45
Singapore 0.86 1.12
New Zealand 1.01 0.88 0.98
Chile 0.61 0.78
P.R. China 0.80 0.72 0.60
Malaysia 0.80 0.37
Mexico 0.31
Indonesia 0.20 0.26
Philippines 0.20 0.21
Hong Kong 0.08
Thailand 0.16 N/A
Sources 1981: Selected country reports (Indonesia/Thailand/Singapore) and Australian Science and Innovation Resources Brief (1994), Australian Department of Industry Science & Technology (DIST). Based on Main S&T Indicators (OECD) No 2, 1993 and NSF, Human Resources for Science and Technology: The Asian Region, NSF 93-303 (Washington DC 1993).
Sources 1991: S&T Analysis Section, Department of Industry, Science and Technology based on OECD and national data, (OECD/STIID data-base as at November 1993, ABS 8122 and 5206, and S&T Analysis Section estimates.
Source 1994: APEC/PECC Pacific Science and technology Profile, Investment & Industrial Science & Technology Working Group. Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and Science & Technology Task Force Pacific Economic Cooperation Council. 1995.
Table 2: Percentage of R&D Expenditure by Sector of Performance:
Selected Economies
Economy Business Higher Government Private/
Sector Education Sector non-profit
Sector Sector
South Korea 71.5 7.2 4.4 16.9
United States 69.6 15.8 10.8 3.7
Japan 66.0 20.1 9.3 4.5
Singapore 62.0 15.8 22.2 0.0
Canada 55.0 26.0 17.0 1.0
Chinese Taipei 52.6 14.4 11.6 21.4
Hong Kong 47.6 19.6 32.7 0.0
Malaysia 45.8 9.0 46.0 0.0
Australia 44.2 26.9 27.6 1.3
New Zealand 28.0 31.0 41.0 0.0
China 22.7 17.7 49.9 9.6
The Philippines 21.8 14.7 58.8 4.7
Indonesia 13.0 4.0 81.0 2.0
Chile 12.0 44.6 42.4 10
Mexico 8.0 41.7 50.3 0.0
Thailand 5.0 20.2 69.6 5.1
Source: APEC/PECC Pacific Science and technology Profile, Investment & Industrial Science & Technology Working Group. Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and Science & Technology Task Force Pacific Economic Cooperation Council. 1995.
Human Resource Development
A striking similarity in the situatation across the economies of the region is that while current GERD expenditures may be relatively low, most nations have embarked on strong programs to build their S&T capability through investments in human resource development. In 1980, Singapore, for example, had 9 research scientists and engineers per 10,000 workforce. In 1990, there were 28 research scientists and engineers per 10,000 workforce, a figure that is steadily rising towards Singapore's 1995 target of 40 research scientists and engineers per 10,000 workforce. Meanwhile, the number of research scientists and technicians in Singapore grew from 6,046 to 9,193 between 1990 and 1992. Singapore's growth is fueled by a current major investment over five years of over $(US)1 billion to strengthen industrial R&D under the National Technology Development Plan; similar programs exist in Indonesia ($US90 million), Malaysia ($US50 million) and Thailand ($US50 million).
Currently, Japan enjoys a ratio of science and engineering personnel in R&D per 10,000 of labour force of 74.9 (in 1990), and 6% of all 22 year olds are enrolled in natural sciences and engineering university degrees. The Republic of Korea is fast catching up. At the end of World War II only 2% of the Korean population over 14 years of age had completed secondary school and the illiteracy rate stood at 78%. Since then enrollments have increased over five times in elementary school, 28.5 times for secondary school, and almost 150 times for tertiary education. Based on this platform of development Korea tripled its university enrollments, and in 1990, 36 % of Korea's youth in the 20 to 24 year old age group were attending universities with the same proportion enrolled in natural sciences and engineering degrees as in Japan (6% of all 22 year olds). Over the same 15 year period, the percentage of the equivalent cohort in Chinese Taipei enrolled in universities rose strikingly from 16 to 27%, whilst in Singapore, it rose from around 7 to almost 20%.
Table 3: Scientist and Engineers Engaged in Full-time Research Activities
by Selected Economies
No. of Scientists No. of Scientists
Economy & Engineers in & Engineers in
Full-time R&D R&D with Univ.
Degree
(persons) (persons)
Australia 78,538 51,506
Canada 114,260 65,210
Chile 5,956 5,956
China 418,500 *
Indonesia 66,568 49,719
Japan 753,870 482,583
South Korea 90,328 87,090
Mexico 8,595 8,557
New Zealand * 6,000
The Philippines 5,344 *
Singapore 9,725 6,629
Chinese Taipei 33,179 *
Source: APEC/PECC Pacific Science and technology Profile, Investment & Industrial Science & Technology Working Group. Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and Science & Technology Task Force Pacific Economic Cooperation Council. 1995.
The science and engineering human resources base from which the less industrialised countries are starting in their current drive to capture advantage from science is relatively low. Consistent indicators are very difficult to obtain, however, it is possible to compare to the numbers of full-time scientists and engineers engaged in research and development activities. Table 3 shows the high level of activity occurring in countries such as Japan and PRC and reflects the comparative size and technological strength of the Japanese economy and the sheer size of the China labour force. However, the size of the scientific labour force is not the only criteria leading to technological advantage. It is instructive to note that while Chinese Taipei has less than half the number of scientists and engineers employed in R&D than does Australia, it has more than twice the rate of patenting activity of Australia.
These figures on domestic research training however, tell only a part of the story. Much of the research training for Asian countries is completed in the advanced country universities of Europe, Australia and North America. For example, 46.1% as many doctoral science degrees and 21.1% doctoral engineering degrees are awarded in the United States to PR Chinese nationals as in China; equivalent percentages for science and engineering doctorates for Republic of Korea students are 46.2% and 44.4% respectively, and for Chinese Taipei, 81.1% and 73.6%. Japan, on the other hand, has a much lower dependency on American doctoral degrees with United States figures representing only 5.6% of science and 1.8% of engineering doctorates awarded in Japan.
An indicator of change in Asia's human resource environment for science is that while the number of students going abroad to study continues to grow, more and more are drawn back home by better salaries, working and living conditions. Indeed, many scientists who have long worked abroad are returning to their own countries to play a leading role in managing new well-equipped institutes and to use their experience to bring their nation's research up to leading edge international standards.
Planning and Decision Making Structures
There has been a strong drive through the Southeast Asian region towards the development of national science policy structures and their integration with economic planning. (Raman and Hill, 1982) As a part of these developments formal institutions for driving science policy that have long been part of the science systems in the industrially developed countries were set in place in countries that previously had only limited science infrastructures. Such institutional developments included the establishment or strengthening of S&T councils, S&T ministries, science academies, and new research institutions. Taking Thailand as an example, the Applied Scientific Research Corporation was established under the nation's second economic development plan of the late 1960s, and a Technology and Environment Planning Division focusing on managing environmental consequences of industrial development was formed in the late 1970s. However, it was not until the early 1980s that the nation's Ministry of Science, Technology and Energy was established under Thailand's Fourth Plan, and the late 1980s when under the Fifth Plan, S&T became an explicit part of national development planning.
Strong attention has, in parallel, been paid to building decision-making capability. Australia played a supportive role in this development through development assistance-based training programs in S&T management and policy for ASEAN countries through the mid-1980s, whilst ASEAN's Council for Science and Technology (ASEAN-COST) and the UNESCO-based Science and Technology Policy Asian Network (STEPAN) that was founded in 1988, prioritised and supported the development of S&T management information systems and training throughout the region. The latest ASEAN plan of action on science and technology spelt out specific guidelines and strategies for intensifying international cooperation in technology transfer and the commercialisation of science.
In both the ASEAN and north Asian regions, many of the countries have now developed long-term S&T planning strategies as a component of their general economic strategies. Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Singapore and the Republic of Korea have all developed science and technology plans that project well into the 21st Century. For Indonesia, their Science and Technology for Industrial Development (STAID) program is an integral part of the government's effort in transforming a predominantly agrarian economy into an industrial economy. Particular attention is placed on leading industrial development through 'strategic industries', in particular, aeronautics, thence energy, telecommunications and so on. The Malaysian 'Industrial Master Plan' now incorporates an Action Plan for Industrial Technology Development (APITD), set within the Prime Minister's concept of a Malaysian '2020 Vision', is supported by a recent 'Intensification of Research in Priority Areas' (IRPA) program, and sets Malaysia on a strategic path of technology development. Singapore aims to achieve the status of a developed nation by the year 2000, and, in the context of its severe limitations in resource endowments, has recognised the indispensability of technological innovation and therefore promotion of R&D. All of these nations are paying explicit attention to the lessons not only of Japan, but of the Republic of Korea where both long-term infrastructure support and industry based R&D have produced extraordinary gains in competitive economic performance. Indeed, in response to this attention, the Republic of Korea inaugurated an explicit S&T policy development assistance program for ASEAN nations in 1994.
International Connections in Regional Science and Technology
During the past decade there has been a significant rise in the level of world class science capabilities among the economies of the Asia-Pacific region. The level of scientific publication from countries throughout the region has risen dramatically. Countries such as South Korea, Chinese Taipei, Singapore and China have all increased their share of scientific publications registered in the ISI-index of scientific publications, in some cases by up to 800 per cent. International scientific collaboration with North America, Europe and Japan is a significant feature of the regional scientific output (Bourke and Butler, 1995).
Australian science performs well according to accepted international indicators of scientific output. For example, Australia stands third in the region, behind Japan and India, according to the volume of scientific publications in major international journals. When this output is measured according to output per million population, Australia comes eighth in the world, well ahead of Japan and Germany. Australia's contemporary strength in terms of scientific excellence are strong. In terms of overall expenditure in R&D per GDP, Australia already ranks comparatively high at 1.34 per cent, but has a growth rate well above countries such as Germany the United States and the United Kingdom (DIST, 1995). However, numbers of publications, general levels of R&D expenditure and so on are only one part of national science and technology activities. Overall science and technology strength depends also on the capacity to organise and make good use of scientific production. It is in the organisation of science and strategies for linking research to a wide range of socio-economic objectives where the most deep seated changes are occurring in national science systems.
To capture the 'flows' of knowledge that an increasingly globalised knowledge economy represents, many of the nations of Asia are paying increasing attention to internationalising their R&D capability, and thus gaining access to knowledge that otherwise is transferred across national boundaries behind the closed walls of multinational organisations. This internationalisation is being done in a variety of ways. The internationalisation of Japan's R&D effort has been associated with the establishment of major R&D centres in Western countries, for example, Canon in France, Hitachi in California, Kobe Steel in Surrey, Kyôcera in Washington, Matsushita Electric in Frankfurt and San Jose, Mitsubishi Electric in Boston, NEC in Princeton, Nissan in Detroit and Bedford, and Sharp in Oxford. Meanwhile, Japan's domestic corporate research base, whilst increasingly connected into the international scientific literature, remains more dependent on Japanese R&D than on any other country.
In the case of the Republic of Korea, the greatest contemporary difficulties faced concern 'growth bottlenecks'. Until now the country has relied on imported technologies from abroad to generate rapid industrial growth. But as the technology gap between the Republic of Korea and the fully industrialised countries has narrowed it has become increasingly difficult to progress further whilst building on imported technologies. Meanwhile, the science and engineering knowledge required remains largely controlled within multinational corporate enterprises and not easily accessible. The Republic of Korea's response has been commitment to a program of domestic and international cooperative R&D ventures, to effectively link academic and business interests and to extend such networks into the international domain. The Cooperative R&D Promotion Law, 1993, has recently been introduced to promote such collaboration.
For the dynamic economies in the region, further development has called for new international strategies. Imported technologies or reverse engineering, the traditional 'catch-up' approach, can no longer sustain growth that relies on leading-edge products and processes. Confronting this problem, Korea has embarked on a national strategy tied to the frontiers of new knowledge. The 'internationalisation' of their science effort is central to this strategy. The Korean government, like many of their international counterparts, have set in place programs to encourage links between academic and business interests and to 'make use' of them as a conduit to the international domain. In addition, Korea, like Japan, is now establishing laboratories in the West (Hill, Turpin and Spence, 1996). Chinese Taipei has responded to development challenges by establishing an Industrial Technology Research Institute to support the growth of small firms with a lack of internal R&D capacity.
For Japan, dominant in science and technology power in Asia, increasing basic research has been defined as an 'urgent' priority. Investment in Japan's Frontier Research Program is focused on science to deal with global problems and 'megascience'. New multisectoral international forms of organisation are emerging as the institutional base for such development. The Institute of Physical and Chemical Research in existence since 1917 has, for example, developed what they describe as an 'internally open and flexible system beyond the framework of traditional research systems'. Research in the program is directed toward areas such as creating 'frontier materials', at elucidating the homeostasis of animals and plants, and understanding mind and brain behaviour. The internationalisation of the research in the program is encouraged through the appointment of foreign scientists as heads of laboratories and scientific advisers. Leading-edge science in such organisations involves a transfer of knowledge and skill that is deeply embedded in international scientific infrastructures.
The Commercial Edge
Governments throughout the region have recognised the difficulties in applying public sector research to generate industrial or broader socio-economic advantage,. As a result there is an increased emphasis on generating R&D within the business sector and to developing new mechanisms for the more effective commercial use of public sector research outcomes.
Indeed, the growth rates of business sector R&D funding among Asia-Pacific countries has generally increased at a faster rate than countries within OECD. While their base levels of business sector funding are high (60% of GERD in the case of Japan), the United Kingdom, Japan, USA and Germany all recorded considerably lower rates of growth in business sector funding during the same period (see Table 4). By 1992 in Singapore, the private sector contributed 62% or $(S)578 million, to national R&D spending.
Table 4: International Rankings by Growth in Business Sector Funding of R&D,
1981 and 1991: Selected Countries.
Economy Av. annual %
real growth
Rep Korea 29.3
Singapore 22.3
Chinese Taipei 16.4
Australia 14.2
Japan 8.8
New Zealand 7.7
India 7.2
Canada 5.4
Germany 5.1
USA 4.0
Source: Measures of Science and Innovation 4, 1994, Table 3.4, Department of Industry Science and Technology (DIST), Australia. The base international data are from Main Science and Technology Indicators, OECD, Paris, 1993, No 2 and NSF 93-303, National Science Foundation, Washington, 1993.
The less developed economies are still having some difficulty in generating business R&D expenditures and are exploring a range of supportive policy mechanisms to assist. These include tax incentives, the development of S&T 'parks' and business incubators, and increased pressure on public sector research to be of direct commercial stimulus to industry. Australia and New Zealand, whilst both of advanced nation economic status, are also relatively small players in the world technological scene and both have also had difficulties in generating adequate commercial application of research and business R&D expenditures. New Zealand radically restructured its public sector research, turning previous government agencies into 'crown corporations' that now compete with each other and private enterprise for 'contestable' research funding. Australia introduced a general rule across its government research establishment that required 30% of funding to come from external earnings beyond government appropriations, and perhaps even more significantly, introduced a major new organisational experiment in the form of 'Cooperative Research Centres'. These organisations bring together academic, government and industry interests into new networked institutional structures focused on key Australian research strengths.
The impact of these science-centred strategies is already being felt. Evidence of a science 'catch-up' is demonstrated in patent data. For example, Chinese Taipei, in the early 1980s, was well behind Australia in the total number of patents registered in the United States. By 1988 they had passed Australia, and by 1991 they had almost doubled Australia's rate. For the Republic of Korea, running behind Chinese Taipei in this regard, have increased their US patenting by 400% in just the last four years. By 1994, the Republic of Korea was registering patents in the USA at twice the rate of Australia. China too, seems to be setting off on a similar trajectory. Meanwhile, Singapore, starting from a very low base of 5 patents in 1983 increased its registrations by a factor of 10 by 1994, registering 54 patents.(CHI, 1995)
With the growth in business sector funding for R&D and commercial application generally throughout the region there has been an increased emphasis on the role of intellectual property legislation in technology transfer. Through the 1990s, under the influence of GATT and the TRIPs agreement there has been a rapid move towards the 'harmonisation' of intellectual property legislation. Whilst the advantage of harmonised legislation for the advanced industrial players has been obvious for some time, the 'catch-up' countries of the region have now also recognised that their alignment with internationally accepted intellectual property legislation creates a more attractive investment climate for potential technological and capital investment from abroad. Consequently, although countries like Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia remain highly marginal technology generators in terms of international patenting, they have become part of the regional trend towards harmonising intellectual property law concerning patents, copyright, designs and trademarks. For some countries such as PR China, legislative frameworks have been introduced as part of the major reform of the entire legal system that is associated with the nation's radical economic restructuring. Legislation concerning specific technologies, such as those related to generation of plant varieties or integrated circuits, has already been introduced amongst the more industrially developed countries in the region.
The role of laws concerning intellectual property protection is particularly important having regard to the rapid growth of information and communication industries which will increasingly form the basis of international trade investment, employment and income growth. In Australia for example export earning from royalties on films, television programs, music and computer software have increased from $240 million to $380 million in the past two years (Dweyer, 1995).. Global trade in high-technology products is estimated at $740 billion annually, a figure said to represent approximately 20% of world trade. Initiatives are accordingly being developed to improve the harmony of intellectual property laws in the region and to assure the enforcement of intellectual property rights across national borders (Prime Minister's Science and Engineering Council, 1993). The ongoing implementation of economic initiatives such as APEC will continue to ensure a focus is maintained on the protection of intellectual property rights.
Comparative Trends and Directions
Today, there is much greater attention amongst the less developed countries of Eastern and South-Eastern Asia to other Asian nations that are now growing much faster than OECD countries and investing much more seriously in science. The Pacific Rim in the 1990s is therefore increasingly beginning to cohere around a regional economic identity in which science is a central feature of development strategy. Though expressed in different ways in different countries there is a general drive to turn public sector science towards the marketplace, and to look for future S&T growth and application within the business sector. Generally also, countries of the region are investing and planning for S&T in the long-term.
Within this context however, the manner in which the priority accorded to S&T is being realised is different in each national situation. Indonesia for example, is still at a comparatively early stage of technological transformation of the economy. Nearly three quarters of total manufacturing output is in industries featuring products with a low-technology intensity. Consequently, small scale industry and the informal sector are prioritised for support. In parallel however, development of sophisticated technological capabilities within 'strategic' industries such as aeronautics, energy and electronics, is a strategy that is strongly supported as a means to 'pull' the economy out of its developing country status. Two key issues confront the nation's science policies. The first is redressing the shortage of skilled engineers and scientists, particularly those with higher degrees. Under international loan funding Indonesia established the Science and Technology for Industrial Development (STAID) program to enrich the S&T resources to set the stage for industrial 'take-off' during the country's sixth five year plan that takes Indonesia to the turn of the century. The second key issue for Indonesia concerns the low participation of industry in R&D. Currently only 30% of Indonesia's R&D expenditure is carried out by the private sector. Long term policies in Indonesia are directed towards raising this proportion to 70%.
Both the Philippines and Thailand share the policy concern of Indonesia for S&T human resource development. Brain drain from Indonesia is relatively low. Overseas trained graduates tend to return home. In the Philippines, where the culture is more Westernised through prior American influence and literacy rates are very high, brain drain is a significant problem. Within this context the Philippines has established an Engineering and Science Education Project (ESEP) to provide an additional 3,000 scientists and engineers by 1998. Under the Philippines Science and Technology Master Plan (STMP) this HRD focus is complemented by developing an S&T culture to strengthen the S&T infrastructure and upgrading R&D capabilities in priority sectors, but at the same time linking endogenous S&T development with industry and technology transfer policies, modernising the production sectors through massive technology transfer from both domestic and foreign sources. Particular attention has therefore been paid to the development of appropriate legislative means of encouraging international technology flows and on the organisation of science and technology institutions to form networks in areas such as agriculture, aquaculture, health, industry and energy ( Ancog, 1995).
In the case of Thailand there is an awareness within government that the strong growth of the 1980s is unlikely to continue unless national technical capability is significantly increased at all levels-from factory technicians to leading edge research scientists. Human resource development, to provide the technical support that industry needs to capture the international flows of technical and economic capital is therefore accorded the highest priority. Thailand places a high priority in further stimulating growth in private sector R&D involvement as well as in expanding international S&T collaboration as a way of strengthening national capability. A particular feature of Thailand's planning for the 1990s is a focus for the first time on specific industrial sectors considered to be the most crucial for future Thai development. Strong support is being given to generic technologies-micro-electronics, information technology and biotechnology (APEC/PECC, 1995).
Malaysia has a well established public research institute base, though oriented primarily towards agriculture, a legacy of prior British colonial administration. Malaysia's research task is to establish the resources required to nurture the nation's long-term '2020' vision as a manufacturing nation. Signs of these changes are already apparent. MIMOS, the electronics research institute, is starting to impact on the development of a national electronics industry, primarily through flows of highly qualified staff into industry; the Malaysia Technology Park outside Kuala Lumpur is attracting considerable international technology-based investment, and the IRPA Grant system is starting to add an industrial perspective to existing leading edge research. Malaysia is paying attention particularly now to strengthening the institutional capacity that stands behind these initiatives and to establishing industry-public sector linkages (Malaysia, National Council for Scientific Research and Development,1993). Industry is being targeted as the source of future growth in national R&D. Towards this end, MIGHT, the Malaysian Industry-Government Group for High Technology, was officially launched in 1993 by the Prime Minister to 'prospect' for industry R&D based opportunities and mobilise technological and industrial capabilities.
While Malaysia is still in transition, the Republic of Korea already has a strong and industry based science infrastructure: half of the approximately 1,000 research institutions in the country are in private industry and half of these are heavily concentrated in the 10 largest chaebol (industrial conglomerates), particularly within the electronics and chemical industries. This capability was developed in association with committed HRD investments during the 1960s and 1970s and strong support of national infrastructure development, and thence powered by very strong industrially led investment in R&D during the 1980s (STEPI, 1994),. By the end of the 1980s decade national investment in R&D was 15.5 times the level it was just one decade earlier. However, success has led the Republic of Korea in its targeted technological market areas to the frontiers of knowledge so that a traditional reliance on reverse engineering of imported technologies must now be replaced by a more basic and visionary science. Central to the Republic of Korea's strategy therefore is the internationalisation of its R&D base. Korean industry is following similar internationalising strategies as Japan in also establishing laboratories in the West. Domestic and international cooperative R&D ventures are being encouraged, as is the more effective linking of academic and business interests as a prerequisite for extending these relationships into the international domain (Nam, 1995; Song, 1995).
Chinese Taipei has an economy that is strongly dominated by small and medium enterprises. The government established the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) in the 1980s to address the small firms' lack of R&D participation. Within the Institute a series of centres focused on key technologies for Chinese Taipei assess international technologies, discriminate between technologies to be imported and those to be developed locally, and seek to galvanise and network with industry. R&D personnel frequently flow from the Institute to industrial enterprise. For example, under ITRI, 47 Chinese Taipei companies are joining to develop notebook computers. Particularly through inter-firm collaborative support for research, Chinese Taipei's overall R&D investment has therefore grown to 12 times its previous size-from 6 to 71 billion New Taiwanese dollars-between 1978 and 1990. Chinese Taipei's recent National Development Plan provided $(US)18 billion in funding for R&D and technology development. National strategy involves moving away from hardware and towards software; a software industrial park is therefore being established to accelerate the development of specialised domestic software industries.
Singapore has made major commitments over the last few years to S&T innovation, fully acknowledging the centrality of its R&D capability to future economic survival of the country (National Science and Technology Board,1994),. The institutional structure for S&T policy was significantly upgraded in 1991 with the formation of the National Science and Technology Board under the Ministry of Trade and Industry. This Board has prioritised the development of high quality strategic research institutes-in information technology, cellular and molecular biology and manufacturing technology. Strengthening of the nation's scientific capacity, that has grown out of Singapore's investments in the late 1980s, has particularly been in the private sector. The government is strongly encouraging further private sector R&D investments and the attraction of leading edge scientists from around the world to work in Singapore towards the possible generation of 'blockbuster' ideas that may be turned into products and even into the creation of whole markets. Strong encouragement is being given to Multinational corporations to locate their highest value added activities in Singapore even if they move more labour intensive production elsewhere. In parallel the new breed of 'technopreneur' (indigenous technologically innovative entrepreneur) that started to become successful in the late 1980s is also being encouraged.
Japan remains the dominant science and technology power in Asia. The nation has however traditionally depended on its industrial sector to take the lead role in R&D. Universities have tended to play a relatively small role in the national innovation system except as selectors of high quality talent and source of networked links into both national and international scientific communities. Japan, as does the Republic of Korea, must now take a leading edge role in the creation of new basic research knowledge. Increasing basic research is no longer stated as merely important, but as urgent. Japan, building on 1980s commitments to basic technologies for future industries, new materials, biotechnology and 'new function elements', and the 1986 investment in Japan's Frontier Research Program, is now focusing on science to deal with global problems, and megascience. Currently attention is being paid to significantly upgrading the support of infrastructure and research throughout the university sector and national research institutes.
Australia and New Zealand both have strong basic research traditions, but have recognised too heavy a reliance on public sector funding that did not produce an adequate stimulus to national industrial innovation. New Zealand responded by comprehensive restructure of public sector research to foster greater competitiveness and has prioritised its relatively small resource base towards research on agriculture based manufacturing whilst increasingly moving towards closer science and technology industry linkages with Asia. Australia similarly is fostering closer S&T and industry ties with Asia, emphasising the formation of partnerships in areas of national research strength that are related to development and to the infrastructure 'walls' that Asian nations are confronting as a direct result of their own rapid growth. At home, emphasis in Australia has been placed on making both academic and public sector research more competitive and targeted towards commercial outcomes whilst at the same time building business participation in R&D. Business sector funding of R&D therefore doubled between 1984/5 and 1991/2, as did business funding of academic research, whilst business support of public sector R&D within CSIRO increased by a factor of 5 to 21.4% of total CSIRO funding. Particular attention is now being paid to building linkages within the national innovation system, for example, through well funded S&T business networking programs and the academic/public sector/business Cooperative Research Centre program .
The face of science and technology across the Pacific Rim therefore conveys a strong expression of vitality, experiment, rising self-confidence, and commitment to building for economic competitiveness in the coming millennium. It should also be recognised, however, that associated with science and technology development through the region there is a rising concern about some of the new challenges this growth has yielded. Firstly, very high investments need to be made in both the human resources and urban and communication infrastructures necessary to maintain S&T led industrial enterprise. Just developing technically skilled S&T resources is not enough. Successful participation in the global technology order that is emerging in the 1990s requires organisational innovativeness and new types of social and managerial capability as well. Each of the countries of the Pacific Rim, starting from quite diverse cultural and organisational practices, has to confront impediments in these cultural and organisational practices to both capture international technological flows and bring national R&D rapidly into commercial application.
Secondly, rapid development has often left behind environmental neglect. Water supply, waste water treatment, solid waste management and sanitation services, for example, are therefore likely to be struggling to cope with the demands being generated by further rapid industrialisation and urban development. Most nations of the Pacific Rim do not have well established R&D capabilities in environmental management. Equally, however there now is a wide-spread recognition of the need. The Republic of Korea, for example, is currently spending $(US)1 billion over the current decade developing environmental technologies and Singapore has made environmental technology a key technology area of the National Science and Technology Board.
Finally, as modern technological change sweeps through the economies, the linkages between more traditional sectors and the remainder of the economy are broken. Often the problem is the non-alignment of technical quality standards. In some cases. a national S&T enterprise is the only source of support for re-integrating the economic and technological pluralism that characterises developing economies. In Laos, for example, although at a very early stage of technological development, maintaining sustainable connections between social, technological and economic development is viewed as a high national priority. A growing feature in contemporary science and technology policy through the region, is therefore, the drive to generate and maintain linkages between different scientific and industrial economic sectors, and between the scientists, industrialists and broader community who are all part of regional technological and socio-economic development.
In the broader global context, trading rules are being redefined, and gaining access to international markets is increasingly leading to cooperative regional development. Although cultural, economic and political differences are likely to remain a feature across the APEC member economies, there is growing evidence that science and technology programs, strategies and cooperation are already a major unifying force in social and economic development across the region.
Table 5: Patents Registered in the United States by Selected Pacific Rim Countries by Year
Year
Economy
1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994
Japan 8,804 11,112 12,756 13,219 16,569 16,158 20,177 19,521 21,028 21,920 20,949 22,384
Chinese Taipei 65 98 174 208 343 457 592 731 898 N/A N/A N/A
Australia 237 296 341 374 386 418 501 435 458 412 372 470
Rep. Korea 26 29 40 49 84 97 160 224 403 537 764 950
China 17 17 15 34 37 65 72 76 87 N/A N/A N/A
Hong Kong 14 24 25 30 34 41 47 52 49 N/A N/A N/A
New Zealand 39 51 33 52 69 54 58 51 40 45 38 36
Singapore 5 4 9 4 12 7 19 12 15 32 39 54
Malaysia 2 2 3 5 2 2 2 3 13 5 13 12
Philippines 5 2 5 1 5 4 7 4 6 6 5 2
Thailand 3 1 1 3 1 2 4 2 3 2 7 5
Indonesia 0 1 1 3 1 2 5 2 2 8 4 8
Source: CHI Research, Inc. Haddon Heights, NJ, U.S.A. (1995), Unpublished Table of Patent counts supplied to the Centre for Research Policy,
University of Wollongong.
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