A Nation Unprepared For New Technologies

Singapore bounces back to the seventh position. China reaches the 11th position in 2022. Canada (15th) returns to the top 15 for the first time since 2016, and… Australia doesn’t really get much of a mention in the whole GII report.

We need to improve our innovation strategy, says Catriona Wallace.

So, now let’s examine the following GII key innovation trends and see if this suggests any key activities Australia needs to take heed of:

Innovation powered in 2020 to 2021 on the back of the pandemic. However, 2022 has seen a contraction and weakening.
China, Turkey and India are growing their innovation capabilities and positioning as powerhouses of innovation.
Innovation progress in the fields of semiconductor speeds, electric battery prices, renewable energy and drug approvals show a significant slowdown from long-term trends.
In contrast to the impressive quarterly year-on-year growth seen in VC deals between Q1 2020 and Q1 2021 (+47.4 per cent), growth in the first quarter of 2022 was notably less strong with +13.2 per cent in Q1 2021.
And for this big next big trend, the GII states: ″Largely due to the short-term influences of the COVID-19 pandemic, the socio-economic impact of innovation seems to be at a low point, with labour productivity and life expectancy experiencing a significant slowdown if not coming to a complete standstill, and in the case of carbon dioxide emissions, failing to show ongoing reductions in pollution.” Crikey – this sounds a bit worrying.

So, clearly, the world is challenged by a slowdown in innovation and productivity. However, some countries are stepping up to the challenge and others, possibly Australia, are not.

A significant issue for Australia has been the lack of investment in non-mining activities. Yes, we are still very focused on digging stuff out of the ground and selling it.

Now, apart from this being hideous for the environment and often for our First Nation’s people, it also suggests structural challenges with policy and the investment landscape. Especially when it comes to Australia’s level of investment into emerging tech – the field I work in.

One of the key topics I have been speaking at length with NSW State Minister Victor Dominello and also Federal Minister Ed Husic is the need for Australia to step up very quickly into policy, strategy, and investment into Web3 and metaverse related technologies.

The challenge that Australia has is that we are not progressing in our innovation capability and now we are staring down the barrel of whole new worlds in Web3 and the metaverse and we are absolutely not ready.

My call to action is this: Australia needs to improve its innovation capability and performance, not only to maintain our standard of living and productivity, but also to protect it from the coming of new business models that Web3 and the metaverse will bring. These are about three to five years away from truly being mainstream so the time is now to invest in and innovate into these emerging technologies.

Let’s try and build a future Australian economy that is services-based and tech friendly – rather than being strongly mining and manufacturing oriented. And let’s see what the Labour government’s $1bn tech fund can actually do, as it is certainly a vast improvement on the previous government’s technology illiteracy – and I quote ex-Prime Minister Morrison, “… we are not a country of tech heads”. We should be.

Dr Catriona Wallace is the founder of Responsible Metaverse Alliance.