Türkiye’s R&D spending soars to $38.1 bln over nine years

ANKARA

Türkiye’s research and development spending in 2015–2024 totaled a record $38.1 billion, led by efforts and projects in defense, aviation and space technologies, according to the country’s statistical office TÜİK.

R&D spending in Türkiye rose from $540.9 million in 2015 to $2.4 billion in 2021, $4.7 billion in 2022, $8.9 billion in 2023 and $15.5 billion in 2024, the data showed.

The rate of R&D spending to gross domestic product (GDP) surged from 0.9 percent in 2015 to 1.46 percent in 2024, when Türkiye’s GDP was a little over $1 trillion.

More than half of R&D spending was financed by companies, while the state contribution stood at 32.1 percent.

Medium-high technology development drove R&D spending from 2015 to 2017, while investments in high-tech gained momentum after the Turkish Industry and Technology Ministry's implementation of the National Technology Initiative strategy plan.

R&D spending in high tech rose over 42-fold from $52.4 million in 2015 to $2.3 billion in 2024.

In the manufacturing industry, companies with high-tech operations accounted for 46.9 percent of the total R&D spending of $5 billion, followed by medium-tech operations at 40.2 percent, medium-low tech at 8.2 percent and low-tech operations at 4.7 percent.

The total number of R&D workers surged by 193,568 in 2015–2025, while the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) employees over the same period more than doubled from 119,905 to 370,473.

Last year, women comprised 34.2 percent of Türkiye’s R&D workforce, totaling 106,074 workers, a significant rise from their 31.4 percent share in 2015, when they numbered 43,048.