Netherlands in top 5 of Europe's most innovative countries
The Netherlands is Europe's fourth most innovative country, according to the European Commissions' European Innovation Scoreboard for 2016. Sweden took first place, like in 2015, followed by Denmark and Finland. The United Kingdom makes up the top 5, NU.nl reports.
The Commission looked at 27 indicators to determine the EU countries' innovative power. These include investments in skills, entrepreneurship and public-private cooperation in the field of innovation. The Netherlands scored well on the quality of scientific publications, the proportion of SMEs that contribute to innovation and the cooperation between companies.
The Netherlands also came in fourth place in the ranking for the fastest growing innovators in Europe. Over the past six years, our country's innovative power increased 10.4 percent more than the EU average.
"Through intensive cooperation between companies, knowledge institutions, innovation power and, consequently, the competitiveness of the Netherlands have been further strengthened in recent years", Minister Henk Kamp of Economic Affairs said in response. He added that continued action is needed to stay on the list. "Our public investment in innovation is above the European average, but Dutch companies' own investments are under. It is now important that entrepreneurs invest more in innovation."
