News item | 15-07-2025 | 16:13
As number three, the Netherlands is also the top in the latest edition of the leading European Innovation Scoreboard (EIS) 2025. Behind Sweden and Denmark, the Netherlands is now arranged as a so -called innovation leader. The Dutch score has declined for the second year in a row. The government wants to turn this tide with an ambitious action plan to invest 3% of the economy in 2030 in research and development.
Where other countries invest in technology and resilience in a targeted way, the Netherlands lags behind. Too little innovation causes dependencies, hinders opportunities for our entrepreneurs, puts jobs at stake, threatens economic safety and in the longer term the affordability of public facilities such as care and safety.
Minister Karremans (Economic Affairs): “Our position in this ranking seems to say:” Innovation is doing well here. “But if you look better, the honest conclusion is that we all have to do more. We invest private and public too little in innovation, do not bring our good knowledge to the market sufficiently and there are few knowledge -intensive companies in the Netherlands. We have to give steps extra, that we have to earn extra steps,”
The Netherlands EU innovation leader, but not a top innovation investor
The now good position of the Netherlands is mainly due to our science, training, digitization and public-private partnerships. But if we no longer invest, we will lose that place in the future. When it comes to investments in research and development (R&D), we are only the number 9 and are far behind in countries such as Germany (3.1%), Austria (3.3%), Belgium (3.3%) and Sweden (3.6%). Together with, among others, France (2.2%), Slovenia (2.1%) and the Czech Republic (1.8%), the Netherlands has not been achieving the 3%standard for years, despite earlier ambitions to fall back.
Innovation leaders are the countries that score more than 25% above the EU average. The requirement assesses all EU member states on 32 indicators and compares these results with other countries from inside and outside Europe. This includes investments in research and development, public-private partnerships, innovation within SMEs, digitization, patent applications, quality of research and the degree of employment within innovative companies.