Global Innovation Index (GII)

The Global Innovation Index 2016 (GII), in its 9th edition this year, is co-published by Cornell University, INSEAD, and the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO, an agency of the United Nations).

• The core of the GII Report consists of a ranking of world economies’ innovation capabilities and results.

Over the last nine years, the GII has established itself as a leading reference on innovation.

The Global Innovation Index (GII) aims to capture the multi-dimensional facets of innovation and provide the tools that can assist in tailoring policies to promote long-term output growth, improved productivity, and job growth.

• India’s ranking in GII-2016 jumped 15 places to 66th position.
• Aiming to strengthen the eco-system of innovation in the country, and thereby further improve India’s ranking in GII, the Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion has decided to set up a Task Force on Innovation.  

The GII helps to create an environment in which innovation factors are continually evaluated. 

It provides a key tool and a rich database of detailed metrics for economies, which in 2016 encompassed 128 economies, representing 92.8% of the world’s population and 97.9% of global GDP.

• Understanding in more detail the human aspects behind innovation is essential for the design of policies that help promote economic development and richer innovation-prone environments locally.

Recognizing the key role of innovation as a driver of economic growth and prosperity, and the need for a broad horizontal vision of innovation applicable to developed and emerging economies, the GII includes indicators that go beyond the traditional measures of innovation such as the level of research and development.

• Innovation is widely recognized as a central driver of economic growth and development. The Global Innovation Index (GII) aims to capture the multi-dimensional facets of innovation.
• Global Innovation Index (GII) 2016 was recently launched in which India has retained the top rank in Information and Communication Technology Service Export for more than last three years.
• India is the top-ranked economy in Central and Southern Asia, and shows particular strengths in tertiary education and R&D, including global R&D intensive firms, the quality of its universities and scientific publications. India also over-performs in innovation relative to its GDP. 
• India ranks second on innovation quality amongst middle-income economies. As per the report, “India is a good example of how policy is improving the innovation environment”. India moved up across all indicators within the Knowledge Absorption sub-pillar. 
• It has also exhibited a solid performance in the GII model’s newly incorporated research talent in business enterprise, where it ranks 31^st.