Description:
This data set contains the aggregated data on the R&D expenditure of businesses, Government, Higher Education, Not-for-Profit Organisations, Science Councils and Research Institutions & Museums for the 2004/05 survey.
Abstract:
The National Survey of Research and Experimental Development (R&D) Survey collects data under strict confidentiality. Aggregate data are used primarily to inform policy and strategic planning at a national level.
The National R&D Survey 2004/05 collected primary data from five survey sectors:
Business sector, made up of companies, business associations and state owned enterprises.
Government sector, made up of national and provincial departments, research institutes and museums.
Higher education institutions sector, made up of universities, technikons and private higher education institutions. Some limited supplementary data from HEMIS was used in this sector.
Not-for-profit organisations (NPO) sector.
Science councils sector.
Some general organisational information was collected. The survey however focused human resources and financial data relating to in-house R&D conducted on the national territory of South Africa.
In-house R&D personnel categories included:
Researchers
Technicians directly supporting R&D
Other personnel directly supporting R&D
Qualifications, gender and race
Full-time-equivalents (FTE) on R&D
In-house R&D expenditure categories included:
Capital expenditure, labour costs and other current expenditure.
Type of R&D (basic research, strategic basic research, applied research, and experimental development)
Provincial location
Sources of funds
Research fields (fields of science)
Socio-Economic Objective
Industry of R&D (Business sector only)
The key users of the data and findings include government departments, especially DST and the OECD who use survey indicators in their annual time-series publication on Main Science and Technology Indicators (MSTI).
Ad hoc requests for data are also accommodated and inform academic papers, reports and other outputs.
Email survey
Face-to-face interview
Postal survey
Telephone interview
The universe of R&D performers was divided into the following five sectors: Business enterprises (BUS): The business sector of large, medium and small enterprises, including state-owned companies. Government (GOV): All government departments with an R&D component, government research institutes and museums. Higher education institutions (HEI): Universities, academic hospitals and technikons. Not-for-profit (NPO) institutions. Science councils (SCI).
The sampling methods of the various sectors are briefly outlined below:
Business sector: a Purposive sampling procedure was employed whereby all known and likely R&D performers were targeted.
Government sector: was surveyed using a census approach. All national and provincial government departments, research institutions and museums performing R&D were included.
Higher education sector: Institutions, namely universities and technikons were included through a census survey.
Not-for-profit organisations (NPO) sector: a purposive sampling procedure was employed whereby all known and likely R&D performers were targeted.
Science councils sector: were surveyed using a census approach.
