The Ministry of Science and Technology and the Korea Institute for Science and Technology Evaluation said on July 15 that Korea`s competitiveness in science has dropped to 19th, three ranks below last year’s ranking (16th) according to the “World Competitiveness Evaluation Report of 2004,” which was written by the Switzerland International Institute for Management Development (IMD). Scientific competitiveness increased to 12th in 2002, but has decreased two years in a row since then.

"The Bank of Korea has changed its criteria for organizing the national account, which dropped the percentage of research and development costs of Gross Domestic Production compared to last year, and causing a fall in the reported level of scientific competitiveness," explained the Ministry of Science and Technology.

In addition, the relatively low level of adolescent interest in science and technology (49th), and the insufficiency of a science education during the compulsive education period (36th) also may have contributed to the low overall rank.

Technological competitiveness, however, has jumped to 8th, 19 ranks higher compared to last year’s finish in 27th place, after the number of high speed internet users (1st) was included in the evaluation criteria.

The survey by the IMD was conducted among 30 OECD member countries, 21 newly-developing economy countries, and nine local economies including Sao Paulo in Brazil.