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January 07, 2022RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT IN THE HIGHER EDUCATION SECTOR, 2019/2020 
Nova Scotia’s higher education research and development (R&D) spending increased by 5.7%, rising from $421.1 million in 2018/2019 to $444.9 million in 2019/2020. This more than reversed the decline in the previous year. Nationally, higher education sector spending on R&D totalled $15.8 billion in 2019/2020, up 4.6% from the previous year. This was the tenth consecutive annual increase nationally. Across Canada, 8 of 10 provinces reported increases in higher education R&D spending, led by British Columbia, Nova Scotia and Manitoba. Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick were the only provinces to report a decline.
On average, R&D spending in Nova Scotia’s higher education sector has been increasing by 4.3% annually since 2000. This is slower than the national long run pace of growth in higher education R&D spending. Newfoundland and Labrador and British Columbia reported the fastest long-run growth in higher education R&D spending while Saskatchewan reported the slowest.
On a per capita basis, Nova Scotia’s higher education sector has the third largest R&D spending in the country at $458.5 per capita, behind Newfoundland and Labrador ($732.5 per capita) and Quebec ($472.2 per capita). Nationally, higher education sector spending on R&D averaged to $420.2 per capita in 2019/2020.
Looking at the higher education sector R&D spending as a percentage of GDP, Nova Scotia had the second largest across Canada at 0.96% of (2019) GDP in 2019/2020. This was just behind Newfoundland and Labrador (1.08%) and was higher compared to the national average of 0.68%.
Higher education R&D spending has been on an upward trend in Nova Scotia since 2000/2001, growing from under 0.8% of GDP in 2000/2001 to over 1.0% from 2012 to 2016. Since then, nominal GDP has growth faster than higher education R&D spending in most years, resulting in some decline in R&D as a share of GDP.
Since 2002, Canada's higher education R&D spending has fluctuated in a narrow range from 0.62% to 0.70% of GDP.
Note: 'CAGR' = Compound annual growth rate
Source: Statistics Canada, Table 27-10-0025-01 Provincial estimates of research and development expenditures in the higher education sector, by funding sector and type of science (x 1,000,000)
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