The Applied Research and Communications Fund has launched a six-month project that aims to explore attitudes and opportunities to address the problem of non-submission of data on research activity of enterprises to the National Statistical Institute in the framework of the Annual Financial Reports.
The project foresees a conference and focus groups with representatives of the entrepreneurial environment, industry and business organisations, with the Ministry of Economy and the National Statistical Institute as well as the Ministry of Finance and the National Revenue Agency. The aim is to propose concrete steps to improve the collection of data on research and innovation activities within the existing legislation. A report with recommendations to the institutions will be prepared.
This is important because this information is generated by Eurostat at European level and becomes the basis for the comparative performance of the country in terms of innovative activity. “Lightening up” this activity is key to positioning the business internationally and raising the country’s profile among innovator countries. Data from the European Innovation Scoreboard 2019 show that Bulgaria is second to last in innovation performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). There has been a 16% decline in SMEs with product and process innovation and a 57% decline in spending on innovation activity.
The project “Hidden Innovations: an analysis of research and innovation activity that remains uncovered by official statistics” is implemented with the financial support of Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway under the EEA Financial Mechanism. The main objective of the project “Hidden Innovations: Analysis of Research and Innovation Activity that remains uncovered by Official Statistics” is to explore attitudes and options to address the problem of non-submission of data on research activity of enterprises to the National Institute of Statistics in the framework of the Annual Financial Reports.
Stay tuned for details!
