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INTRODUCTION

1 This publication presents estimates of expenditure and human resources devoted to R&D carried out by organisations in the Higher education sector during 2000.

2 For details of R&D statistics available for the Business enterprise and General government and Private non-profit sectors see paragraph 18.

DATA SOURCES

3 The 2000 statistics presented in this publication have been compiled from data collected from universities in the ABS Survey of Research and Experimental Development in respect of the year ended 31 December 2000.

4 The GDP figures used to derive higher education expenditure on R&D/GDP ratios are current at the time of manuscript finalisation (National Income, Expenditure and Product, December Quarter 2001 (Cat. no. 5206.0)) and, at current prices, are as follows: $425,707m (1992–93); $471,348m (1994–95); $502,828m (1995–96); $529,886m (1996–97); $591,592m (1998–99); and $672,046m (2000–01). The available higher education expenditure on R&D/GDP ratios for other OECD countries are current at time of manuscript finalisation and are sourced from Main Science and Technology Indicators, 2001-2, OECD, Paris, 2001.

DEFINITIONS

5 R&D is defined in accordance with the OECD standard as comprising creative work undertaken on a systematic basis in order to increase the stock of knowledge, including knowledge of man, culture and society, and the use of this stock of knowledge to devise new applications.

6 Type of R&D activity comprises pure basic research, strategic basic research, applied research and experimental development. Data in this classification are subjectively allocated by respondents at the time of reporting, using OECD/ABS definitions. The ABS makes every effort to ensure correct and consistent interpretation and reporting of this data and applies consistent processing methodologies. Analysts using this classification should bear the original subjectivity in mind.

7 For a more comprehensive interpretation of the definition of R&D activity, contact the ABS or refer to the OECD publication The Measurement of Scientific and Technological Activities ('Frascati Manual' 1993), OECD, Paris 1994.

SCOPE AND COVERAGE

8 The Higher education sector is defined by OECD as including all universities and other institutions of post-secondary education whatever their source of finance or legal status.

9 For the ABS R&D surveys of this sector, only universities are surveyed. The universities are asked to include R&D carried out by them as participants in unincorporated Cooperative Research Centres (CRCs), but to exclude any R&D for incorporated CRCs as they are included in the Business enterprise sector. Other institutions (e.g. Technical and Further Education colleges) are excluded because it is considered that their contribution to total R&D activity would be minimal.

SOCIO-ECONOMIC OBJECTIVE AND RESEARCH FIELDS, COURSES AND DISCIPLINES CLASSIFICATIONS

10 The statistics in this publication are classified by Socio-economic objective and Research fields, courses and disciplines. For more information on these classifications see the Australian Standard Research Classification, 1998 (Cat.no.1297.0).

COMPARABILITY WITH PREVIOUS STATISTICS

11 The research classifications used in this publication differ from those used in earlier years. The classifications used in this publication were from the 1998 edition of the Australian Standard Research Classification whereas the 1993 edition was used for previous publications.

METHODOLOGY FOR DERIVING UNIVERSITY R&D EXPENDITURE ESTIMATES

12 Universities were asked to provide the ABS with the following data:

• direct staff inputs into R&D (i.e. personnel resources expended in undertaking R&D projects);
• other staff resources directly supporting R&D by providing direct services to the researchers but not undertaking research in their own right; and
• direct expenditure on R&D (i.e. the expenses directly attributable to research projects).

• in cases where an allowance for overheads had already been included in the data reported by a university, no adjustments were made to the data; and
• where an allowance had not been included, either:
  • the university identified overhead costs and estimated the R&D part to be apportioned across relevant projects, etc.; or
  • the ABS applied agreed factors to the reported data.

• Many data providers had to make estimates because their accounts do not separately record data on R&D activity.
• The OECD standard definition of R&D used in this survey differs in some respects from what data providers may regard as R&D activity.
• Some data providers had difficulties describing their R&D programs in terms of Socio-economic ojectives, Research fields, courses and disciplines and Type of R&D activity. The data presented under these classifications therefore reflect a degree of subjectivity.
• The estimation of overhead R&D expenditure was subjective and varied across universities.