User:John Cummings/Articles/Global Innovation Index

The Global Innovation Index (GII) published by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) is an annual ranking of countries by their capacity for, and success in, innovation. The GII 2021 measures the most recent global innovation trends and ranks the innovation ecosystem performance of 132 economies, while highlighting innovation strengths and weaknesses and particular gaps in innovation metrics.

Since its inception in 2007, an increasing number of governments systematically analyze their annual GII results and design policy responses to improve their performance. The GII has also been recognized by the UN General Assembly in its 2019 resolution on Science, Technology and Innovation for Sustainable Development as a benchmark for measuring innovation in relation to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

History
The index was started in 2007 by INSEAD and World Business, a British magazine. It was created by Prof. Soumitra Dutta. WIPO started its association with the GII in 2011 and began co-publishing the GII in 2012. In 2013, Cornell University joined as co-publisher, with Professor Dutta representing the GII at Cornell University and Bruno Lanvin at INSEAD. The GII continued to be co-published by Cornell University, INSEAD and WIPO up to 2020. As of 2021, the GII is published by WIPO, in partnership with the Portulans Institute, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), the Brazilian National Confederation of Industry (CNI), Ecopetrol Group and the Turkish Exporters Assembly (TIM) and is supported by its GII Advisory Board and Academic Network.

Methodology
The overall GII ranking is built based on two sub-indices that are both equally important in presenting a complete picture of innovation:


 * Innovation Input Sub-Index: Five input pillars capture elements of the economy that enable and facilitate innovative activities.
 * Innovation Output Sub-Index: Two outputs pillars capture the result of innovative activities within the economy.

Although the Output Sub-Index includes only two pillars, it carries the same weight as the Input Sub-Index in calculating the overall GII. Each of the seven pillars measure an attribute of innovation and is divided into three sub-pillars. Each sub-pillar is composed of up to five individual indicators.

The GII has been criticized for giving excessive significance attributed to factors that aren’t integral to innovation. For instance, “Ease of Paying Taxes“, “Electricity Output“(half-weightage) and “Ease of Protecting Minority Investors” are factors alongside “Ease of Getting Credit” and “Venture Capital Deals“.

Data
Around 80 different data indicators related to innovation ecosystems make up the GII. Most indicators are based on factual and objective innovation data from official sources. A few survey data points are also included. In the GII 2021 edition, a total of 81 indicators were derived from several different sources, as listed in the table below.

Themes
Every two years the GII covers a theme related to innovation which goes beyond the innovation rankings. In 2020, the theme was “Who will finance innovation?” shedding light on the state of innovation financing by investigating the evolution of existing mechanisms and pointing to progress and remaining challenges. Previous GII themes covered health innovation, environmental innovation, agricultural and food innovation, and others.

Ranking
The top 50 ranking for 2021: