Innovation, R&D investment and productivity in Chile

Abstract

This paper uses two sources of information and different methodologies to analyze the causal effect of product and process innovation on productivity in the Chilean manufacturing industry during the past decade. In general, the evidence suggests there is not a contemporaneous effect of product innovation on productivity, but there is a positive effect of process innovation. This notsignificant effect of product innovation contrasts with evidence of studies for other countries. However, the results show the presence of lagged effects product innovation on productivity two years after innovation. Compared with the case of developed countries, this evidence might be consistent with a very slow process of "learning by doing" on the part of Chilean firms with regard to mastering new technologies. These slow and frequently uncertain gains in productivity could help to explain the low levels of investment in research and development (R&D) activities by Chilean firms. JEL Classifications: D22, D24, D92capital endowments, macroeconomic volatility, insufficient provision of public goods, and shortcomings in the regulatory framework, among other reasons. 1 This paper aims to contribute to a better understanding of the relationship between R&D and productivity in Latin America, by focusing on the Chilean experience. At first glance, the Chilean case does not deviate much from the historical pattern of Latin America. Although Chile ranked at the top of regional positions for some indicators during the 1990s, this was not true during the preceding decades. Furthermore, when compared to developed countries in most of the R&D measures, Chile lags behind significantly. Table 3 shows R&D expenditure over GDP and R&D per capita (in 1996 constant dollars). Although in recent years Chilean R&D expenditure has surpassed 0.6 percent of GDP, it is still below the 0.84 percent that Brazil averaged for the 1990s and is very close to the 0.52 percent regional average during the same period. By the same token, the average R&D expenditure per capita in the region was close to US$33 during the 1990s. The Chilean average was US$46, still below the US$54 that Brazil averaged during the same period. With respect to sources of funding for R&D, the main source by 2004 was the private sector with 46 percent, according to UNESCO; the government and universities financed the rest.Regarding R&D output, Latin American countries underperform compared to leading countries, and Chile is not an exception. Consider the number of patents granted in the United States to researchers not living in the United States (Table 4). Researchers across all of Latin America obtained 258 patents during 2000-04, while Australian researchers received 858 patents. According to Bravo-Ortega and García (2007), Brazil obtained an average of 108 patents, Argentina 53.6, and Chile a modest 13 patents per year.With the exception of a few studies, there is not much evidence on the impact of research activities on productivity in Chile (Benavente, 2006). Previous results show that ...

Expression of postsynaptic Ca2+‐activated K+ (SK) channels at C‐bouton synapses in mammalian lumbar α‐motoneurons

“…Likewise, despite dense monoaminergic innervation of the ventral horn MNs , no appositions were observed between 5-HT-immunoreactive terminals and SK3 clusters. Finally, there was no overlap or relationship between SK3-immunoreactivity and immunostaining for gephyrin, a postsynaptic scaffolding protein present at inhibitory glycinergic and GABAergic synapses on MNs (Alvarez et al 1997).…”

“…Kv2.1 immunohistochemistry was performed using mouse anti-Kv2.1 clone D4/11 at 1:1000 dilution that was developed and/or obtained from the UC Davis/NINDS/NIMH Neuromab facility, supported by NIH grant U24NS0506060 and maintained by the Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, University of California (Davis, CA, USA). All primary antibodies were diluted in PBS-T 0.1%, pH 7.4, and incubated overnight at 4 • C. The sensitivity and specificity of the primary antibodies against the various synaptic proteins and neuronal markers have been previously described by researchers in our laboratory (Alvarez et al 1997(Alvarez et al , 1999Deng & Fyffe, 2004;Muennich & Fyffe, 2004). Immunoreactivity was detected with species-specific secondary antibodies conjugated to fluorescein isothiocyanate, Cy3 or DyLight 649 (Jackson J Physiol 591.4 Immunoresearch, West Grove, PA, USA) diluted 1:50 in PBS-T 0.1%, pH 7.4, and incubated at room temperature for 2-4 h. Given that the antibodies against SK3 and SK2 were raised in the same host species (rabbit), the coexpression studies employed a sequential immunostaining process.…”

Firms' Innovation, Public Financial Support, and Total Factor Productivity: The Case of Manufactures in Peru

“…Finally, two recent studies of Álvarez et al () and Demmel et al () analyze the case of innovation for manufacturing firms in Chile, and that of Argentina, Mexico, Colombia, and Peru. The Chilean study found that: larger plants are more likely to invest in R&D; R&D intensity increases the probability of process innovation; R&D intensity does not affect the probability of product innovation; low appropriability reduces the probability of process innovation; larger firms are more likely to introduce product innovation; and the process innovation increases productivity.…”

“…Finally, sources of information (i.e. INFO jit ; for j = 1, 2, 3) for innovation and techological resources as the use of infomation and communication technologies ( D ICTit ) and availability of research infrastructure ( D INFRAit ) are introduced as in Álvarez et al (), Griffith et al (), and Surroca and Santamaría ().…”

Product and process innovation and total factor productivity: Evidence for manufacturing in four Latin American countries

“…Some exceptions (from Table ) that account for some dynamics in the relationship between innovation and productivity are Arza and López () and Chudnovsky, López, and Pupato (), for Argentina, and Cassoni and Ramada (), for Uruguay, who exploit the panel dimension of their data. Also, Alvarez, Bravo‐Ortega, and Navarro () and Benavente and Bravo (), for Chile, Arbeláez and Torrado (), for Colombia, and Tello (), for Peru, who consider possible delayed effects of innovation outputs on productivity. However, to the best of our knowledge, we are only aware of three studies that use TFP measures to analyze the relationship between innovation outputs and productivity in Latin America.…”