Analysis and assessment of the innovation development state of Kazakhstan

Abstract

The article analyzes the indicators of innovation statistics and assesses of Kazakhstani innovationand research capacity. The purpose of the article is to assess and analyze the innovative potential ofKazakhstan based on the results of statistics from government departments and data from internationalrating agencies. There was a comparative analysis between the official data of the annual bulletins of theBureau of National Statistics “On innovation activities of enterprises in the RoK”, “Key indicators of R&Dactivities in the RoK” and annual reports of the Global Competitiveness Index. Innovation capacity is the key factor affecting country competitiveness that requires presence of anecosystem for stimulating and supporting innovation. For this, the following conditions are necessary:sufficient investment in R&D; the presence of high-quality scientific research institutions that can generatethe basic knowledge needed to build the new technologies; extensive collaboration in research andtechnological developments between universities and industry; and the protection of intellectual property.The analysis results have revealed that the following factors, such as the lack of funding for R&Dand innovation activities, a small share of innovation activities among companies and the low qualityof research institutes, create barriers for complete development of the Kazakhstan innovation capacity.Comparison of the indicators of the international ranking of the GCI and domestic statistic data ininnovation and R&D, including the assessment methodology and analysis of questions and associatedanswers of the Executive Opinion Survey, shows that domestic statistics should also track the followingindicators, such as the development of clusters, the quality of research institutions, the sophistication ofbuyers and cited publications.In addition, it was noted that for a more objective assessment of the country’s competitiveness, aswell as for the development of an innovation policy, it is advisable to use other alternative results ofworld rankings, in particular, the results of the Global Innovation Index and the world competitivenessranking of the International Institute of Management Development (IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook– IMD WCY).Key words: innovation, science, innovation capacity, knowledge economy, innovation activity,competitiveness index.