A Comparative Study on Turkey’s Science and Technology (S&T) Indicators

Science and technology (S&T) indicators are important in evaluating how successful countries are in factors described by endogenous growth models. Accordingly, the aim of this paper is to investigate S&T indicators of Turkey in a comparative and more hitherto comprehensive study and to present a guiding reference for researchers and decision makers working on innovation and technology policies. This study was carried out using online databases such as those of the OECD, World Bank, Eurostat, and TÜİK considering the criteria used in the literature to measure countries’ R&D and innovation performances, and Turkey’s innovative performance is presented in comparison with the world’s by summarizations within the scope of the study. The results demonstrate that Turkey has made significant progress in the last 20 years in terms of R&D and innovation, but it is still far from reaching the indicators of developed countries. In particular, the increase in R&D and innovation performance has decreased due to the economic difficulties experienced in the world and in Turkey after 2012 and 2013. Based on the indicators evaluated in this study, some suggestions are given and prioritized to increase Turkey’s innovation performance.