Governments, international organizations, and science policy institutions worldwide are increasingly aware of the importance of timely, reliable statistical information about science, technology, and innovation to inform policymaking.  In the United States, the National Science Foundation (NSF) is responsible for collecting and publishing this information and has been doing so since the 1950s.  Every other year since 1972, the National Science Board (NSF's governing body) has pulled together key data from NSF's statistical reports, supplemented with commissioned studies, and prepared a comprehensive report on the state of U.S. science and technology known as Science and Engineering Indicators.  In recent years, a growing number of governments have been issuing similar reports on their own countries. 

Many S&T indicator reports and other statistical reports on science and technology are available online.  However, these reports are not always easy to find and there does not seem to be a directory or other resource to facilitate access to them.  This week's Tidbit is a first step toward such a resource. The information is in English, unless otherwise noted.

Links:
= highly recommended

AUSTRALIA:  Australian Science and Technology at a Glance, 2000.

BRAZIL:  S&T Indicators for Brazil (in Portuguese).

CANADA: Science and Technology Indicators for Canada (and downloadable versions of other S&T publications from Industry Canada, mostly 1997 and older).

CHILE:  S&T Indicators for Chile (in Spanish).

FINLAND:  Statistics on R&D in Finland (updated January 3, 2002).  Finland has one of the highest ratios of R&D to gross domestic product in the world.

FRANCE:  Principal Research Statistics on France, 1998, from Cordis, the European Community R&D Information Service in Luxembourg. 

HUNGARY:  R&D in Hungary (Download 5MB pdf file).

ICELAND:  R&D Statistics on Iceland (from OECD, posted by the Icelandic Research Council in Reykjavik).

JAPAN: S&T Indicators Announced by NISTEP  (press release from the National Institute for Science and Technology Policy, including a brief summary of the report).

MEXICO:  Indicators of Scientific and Technological Activities, 1990-1999, for Mexico (in Spanish).

NETHERLANDS:  1998 Science and Technology Indicators (English summary), from the Netherlands Observatory of Science and Technology.

NORWAY:  Science and Technology Indicators for Norway, 1999 and 2000.

PORTUGAL:  Main Science and Technology Indicators 1988-1997 for Portugal (Now includes preliminary update for 1999).

RUSSIA:  Russian Science and Technology at a Glance, 2000.  From the Centre for Science Research and Statistics of the Ministry of S&T Policy, Moscow.  A detailed description (in English) and list of tables. The reports, however, are not online and must be ordered by e-mail or fax.

SINGAPORE:  Year 2000 Annual Survey of R&D in Singapore (from A*Star -- the Agency for Science, Technology, and Research -- PDF file).

SOUTH KOREA: Main Science and Technology Indicators for South Korea (2000).

SRI LANKA: S&T Indicators (mostly from 1996).

TAIWAN:  Monthly Bulletin of Statistics (including S&T).

UNITED KINGDOM:  SET Statistics 2000. A summary of key science, engineering and technology indicators for the United Kingdom.

UNITED STATES:
U.S National Science Foundation, Division of Science Resources Studies.  By far the largest repository of statistical data and analysis related to science and technology on the web. Includes the latest Science and Engineering Indicators, a variety of surveys, issue briefs, and online databases. The data here are generally at least one or two years old.

AAAS R&D Budget and Policy Program.  The most up-to-date information on R&D in the U.S. federal budget, updates on congressional action, tables and charts, analytical reports, and related information.

California Science and Technology Indicators.  It's not a nation, but its economy and R&D systems are bigger than all but a few countries in the world.  Published in August 1999, this report has everything you need to know about S&T in the Golden State and more.

Physics Education and Employment Data (U.S.) from the American Institute of Physics
 

INTERNATIONAL AND REGIONAL:
Analyses of R&D in major countries.  Although this site, which was put together by the U.S. Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest Laboratory, is presumably devoted to energy R&D, the sections on individual countries (Canada, U.S., Germany, Italy, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Japan, and the European Union) have a considerable amount of information on all aspects of their R&D systems.

CORDIS S&T Indicators for the European Research Area (2002).

Eurostat -- Key Indicators, including S&T.  Another source of statistics about Europe.

OECD Science, Technology, and Industry Scoreboard 2001 (new site). Comparative statistical information on nearly all of the major R&D performing countries in the world.   OECD has finally put some of its data on line.  It's a wonderful resource.  If you come in via OECD's home page, it takes some digging to get here, but the link above goes directly to the page.   This is an experiment; you can encourage OECD to put more of its data online by contacting Toby Green. 

UNESCO Statistical Yearbook 1999, Science & Technology section.  Statistics for many countries that are impossible to find elsewhere, but in a format that can be difficult to read.

World Bank S&T Indicators (links to other organizations).