In de meest actuele analyse en aanbevelingen voor economisch herstel in ons land geeft de OECD een reeks behartigenswaardige gedachten mee voor het kennis- en innovatiebeleid. Zo wordt onder meer het volgende aanbevolen.
"Based on the recommendations from the top teams, the government is currently working out detailed policy measures with implementation starting in the first half of 2012. Top teams can exploit a broad range of experiences and insights to improve the formulation of framework policies, particularly within industries.
Indeed, this represents a possibility for ensuring that sector regulation is as uniform as possible to promote general framework conditions. Drawing on the experience with the current top teams, the government should consider establishing similar teams for more sectors to provide information and suggestions about how to make sector regulation more growth friendly."
Taxibranche topsector?
Maar dan zouden EL&I, OCW en de topsectoren zelf wel nog een heel kritisch moeten kijken naar de nu ingezette opzet en koers. Is deze wel spits en doelgericht genoeg? Is het niet allemaal nog veel te vaag? "The definition of the selected sectors may also be too broad, as not all industries need specific attention to promote exports and R&D and some would be better served by the application of general framework conditions (such as competition policy) to ensure favourable framework conditions."
De Parijse experts komen dan met een nogal vals voorbeeldje. Wellicht ingegeven door hun ervaringen als Thalys-reizigers of Schiphol-bezoekers met de Nederlandse taxibranche. "For example, the selected logistic sector could include industries as different as international and domestic road haulage and taxis."
Blijft het allemaal zo algemeen, dan zullen de topsectoren niet bijdragen aan scherp en door feiten onderbouwd beleid, zo waarschuwt men. "Thus, to secure an efficient use of available public funds, the scope of the top sectors should become more clearly defined in terms of only including industries where there is an objective need for public support. This would also contribute to enabling the planned move towards evidence based policy making."
Fiscaal complexer dan zinvol
Het inruilen van innovatie en kennissubsidies door fiscale premies en instrumenten vindt de OECD interessant, maar men noteert meteen aanzienlijke gevaren. "An important aspect of the reform of the innovation framework is to replacing direct subsidies with broader tax incentives. This is combined with a move towards evidence based policy by establishing an indicator and monitoring system to guide innovation policies.
This shift is commendable as it is move away from "picking winners" to a broader policy framework. However, the planned doubling in the number of R&D tax credits is likely to make the framework more complex. Thus, the policy framework could be further simplified by reducing the number of R&D tax credits. Moreover, innovation policies have been changed quite frequently."
Wat heeft een universiteit er eigenlijk aan?
Ook het betrekken van de universiteiten bij de topsectoren beziet de OECD met een scherp oog. Waarom zou een academicus eigenlijk meedoen? Wat krijgt zij er de facto voor terug? "The government is entering an agreement with universities to foster research being brought to the market. However, university staff have little economic incentive for these activities as they often neither enjoy higher salaries nor share patents rights. To enhance researchers' incentives to market the result of their research, clear and more generous rules for sharing patents rights should be established."
Meer in het algemeen waarschuwt de OECD voor een topsectoren-opzet die vooral de usual suspects een handje helpt in crisistijden, maar de nieuwe, groei aanjagende innovatoren en vernieuwende sectoren voor de deur laat staan. "Another issue is that the new innovation policy will tend to direct resources to traditional research oriented industries without necessarily promoting innovation in services, where new approaches to design, marketing, organisational structures and other intangibles are becoming increasingly important.
The new policies for the business sector are commendable for focussing on framework conditions. Whether the policies, however, will deliver the expected results in the context of globalisation is unclear. Most export and innovation activities are undertaken by large firms, while the aggregated contribution of SMEs in these areas is modest. Thus, policies to address market failures for smaller firms are unlikely to have much effect on the ability to benefit from globalisation unless they work in this direction."