New Delhi, September 03: India scripted a proud moment as for the first time, India has climbed 4 spots and has been ranked 48th by the World Intellectual Property Organization in the Global Innovation Index 2020 rankings. With this India is now among the top 50 innovative countries despite going through the tough patches due to the Covid-19 crisis.

 

 

India was at the 52nd position in 2019 and was ranked 81st in the year 2015. It is a remarkable achievement to be in a league of highly innovative developed nations all over the globe.

 

 

According to the report, the jump can be attributed to newly available indicators and improvements in various areas of the GII. India ranks in the top 15 in indicators such as ICT services exports, government online services, graduates in science and engineering, and R&D-intensive global companies. This happed because of Universities such as the Indian Institute of Technology in Bombay and Delhi and the Indian Institute of Science in Bengaluru, and its top scientific publications.

 

India has also made the most significant progress in the GII innovation ranking over time. The country retains the regional top rank and becomes third in the rankings among the lower-middle-income economies. The report has also called India as the lower-middle-income economy with the highest innovation quality. GII 2020 also indicates that India increases the most in three pillars: Institutions (61st), Business sophistication (55th), and Creative outputs (64th).

 

 

 

In the ranking done in various income groups, India was ranked third in the Lower middle-income economies, after Vietnam and Ukraine. Countries were categorized into four groups for this ranking, high income, upper middle income, lower middle income, and low-income economies. Moreover, Switzerland, Sweden, the US, the UK, and the Netherlands lead the innovation ranking. However, South Korea joined the top 10 for the first time while Singapore is at number 8. The top 10 is dominated by high-income countries.

 

WIPO in its Global Innovation Index (GII) 2020 has also noted that the COVID-19 pandemic is severely pressuring a long-building rise in worldwide innovation, likely hindering some innovative activities while catalyzing ingenuity elsewhere, notably in the health sector. Further moreover 131 countries were analysed under the GII before arriving at the rankings. The metrics include institutions, human capital and research, infrastructure, market sophistication, and business sophistication, knowledge and technology outputs, and creative outputs.

 

Reacting to the news Indian government said the call for Aatma Nirbhar Bharat by the Prime Minister could only be realized if India punches above its weight class and compete with global superpowers in developing scientific interventions. It is time that India brings a paradigm shift and aims to be in the top 25 countries in the next global innovation index rankings.

 

Vice President of India M. Venkaiah Naidu has expressed happiness over the news saying, "Happy to note that India climbed 4 spots to 48th position in Global Innovation Index 2020. My compliments to all stakeholders involved in improving India’s ranking. We need to further strengthen our #innovation ecosystem to make India one of the leading countries in the coming years."