TY - JOUR
T1 - Countries' research priorities in relation to the Sustainable Development Goals
AU - Confraria, Hugo
AU - Ciarli, Tommaso
AU - Noyons, Ed
N1 - Funding Information:
We thank Agustina Colonna for invaluable research assistance. This paper has benefited from discussion with and suggestions by Valeria Arza, Rigas Arvanitis, Luis Bértola, Astra Bonini, Leslie Chan, Joanna Chataway, Maria Cortes-Puch, Enric Fuster, Oscar Goyeneche, Yaso Kunaratnam, Francesco Massucci, Claire Melamed, Irmgard Nübler, Ismael Ràfols, George Richardson, Miguel Sierra, Juergen Wastl, Patrick Wilson, seminar participants at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), UK Collaborative on Development Research (UKCDR), Global Forum of Funders, and participants at the following conferences: EU-SPRI, International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics (ISSI), CONCORDi, Globelics, INET-OECD workshop. We gratefully acknowledge funding from the AHCRH/GCRF grant: STRINGS – Steering Research and Innovation for the Global Goals ( AH/S011501/1 ). An earlier version of this work was prepared as a chapter published in the STRINGS report: Changing Directions: Steering Science Technology and Innovation towards the Sustainable Development Goals. All errors remain the responsibility of the authors.
Funding Information:
We thank Agustina Colonna for invaluable research assistance. This paper has benefited from discussion with and suggestions by Valeria Arza, Rigas Arvanitis, Luis B´ertola, Astra Bonini, Leslie Chan, Joanna Chataway, Maria Cortes-Puch, Enric Fuster, Oscar Goyeneche, Yaso Kunaratnam, Francesco Massucci, Claire Mel-amed, Irmgard Nübler, Ismael R‘afols, George Richardson, Miguel Sierra, Juergen Wastl, Patrick Wilson, seminar participants at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), UK Collaborative on Development Research (UKCDR), Global Forum of Funders, and participants at the following conferences: EU-SPRI, International Conference on Scientometrics and Informetrics (ISSI), CONCORDi, Globelics, INET-OECD workshop. While Hugo Confraria is currently affiliated with the Joint Research Centre (European Commission), the research work he did for this paper was conducted while at SPRU and UECE. We gratefully acknowledge funding from the AHCRH/GCRF grant: STRINGS – Steering Research and Innovation for the Global Goals (AH/S011501/1). An earlier version of this work was prepared as a chapter published in the STRINGS report: Changing Directions: Steering Science Technology and Innovation towards the Sustainable Development Goals. All errors remain the responsibility of the authors.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Author(s)
PY - 2024/4/1
Y1 - 2024/4/1
N2 - We analyse how countries' research priorities align with their greatest Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) challenges and whether misalignments are worse in certain SDGs. Employing a novel method, we identify research related to an SDG by examining research areas in WoS with a higher share of publications containing text related to SDG policy outlets. Then, we use the SDG indicators to create a new score to assess the performance of countries in SDGs in relation to the top performers. Our analysis at the global level reveals a substantial misalignment. Although low and lower-middle income countries tend to face higher SDG challenges, only <10 % of SDG-related research is conducted in these regions. At the SDG-country level, we observe a positive alignment between countries' research priorities and SDG challenges only for SDG1 (No poverty), SDG2 (Zero hunger), SDG6 (Clean water and sanitation), and SDG9 (Industry, innovation, and infrastructure). This means that countries with higher SDG challenges are relatively specialised in research related to these specific goals. Conversely, for all other SDGs, our findings indicate a misalignment or an inconclusive relationship between SDG challenges and research prioritisation. A notable misalignment occurs in SDG12 (Responsible consumption and production), where the countries with the most unsustainable consumption/production patterns are high income countries that are not specialised in research related to SDG12. Our conclusions, underscore the need for research priorities to be more aligned with national SDG challenges, and advocate for more research funds to be directed towards low and lower-middle income countries.
AB - We analyse how countries' research priorities align with their greatest Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) challenges and whether misalignments are worse in certain SDGs. Employing a novel method, we identify research related to an SDG by examining research areas in WoS with a higher share of publications containing text related to SDG policy outlets. Then, we use the SDG indicators to create a new score to assess the performance of countries in SDGs in relation to the top performers. Our analysis at the global level reveals a substantial misalignment. Although low and lower-middle income countries tend to face higher SDG challenges, only <10 % of SDG-related research is conducted in these regions. At the SDG-country level, we observe a positive alignment between countries' research priorities and SDG challenges only for SDG1 (No poverty), SDG2 (Zero hunger), SDG6 (Clean water and sanitation), and SDG9 (Industry, innovation, and infrastructure). This means that countries with higher SDG challenges are relatively specialised in research related to these specific goals. Conversely, for all other SDGs, our findings indicate a misalignment or an inconclusive relationship between SDG challenges and research prioritisation. A notable misalignment occurs in SDG12 (Responsible consumption and production), where the countries with the most unsustainable consumption/production patterns are high income countries that are not specialised in research related to SDG12. Our conclusions, underscore the need for research priorities to be more aligned with national SDG challenges, and advocate for more research funds to be directed towards low and lower-middle income countries.
KW - Bibliometrics
KW - Research priorities
KW - Science policy
KW - Scientific capabilities
KW - Sustainable Development Goals
U2 - 10.1016/j.respol.2023.104950
DO - 10.1016/j.respol.2023.104950
M3 - Article
SN - 0048-7333
VL - 53
JO - Research Policy
JF - Research Policy
IS - 3
M1 - 104950
ER -