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Immediately following the launch of “Venturous Australia” – the comprehensive report on innovation in Australia - Gerhard Vorster, Managing Partner Consulting and leader of Innovation at Deloitte talked with Dr Terry Cutler, the Chairman of the National Innovation Review on what the review will mean to government, to business and to individual Australians.

“Innovation is not the opportunity. It is the imaginative response to opportunities”, the report states. An opportunity Dr Cutler said needs to be taken now before it is too late, as Australia continues to stall on productivity growth and at 20% saturation, has one of the lowest trade intensities in the world.

He said, “Only 90 of the top exporters have a trade intensity greater than 10% and only 49 have a trade intensity greater than 50%.”

The implications for Australia’s innovation policy to renew and re-cast systems and where necessary re-imagine them are therefore huge. 

The end goal is innovation-led prosperity for Australia.

The review which was conducted across Australia in 2008 for the Minister for Industry, Innovation, Science and Research, looked at the investments required and identified four areas of key thrust for innovation policy where business can be the “cornerstone of an innovation-based economy”:

1. Entrepreneurial firms and innovative workplaces
2. Australia’s talent pool – its human capital and social networks
3. Information flows and freedoms to innovate
4. Global integration

Related links:

• media release
• Jason Dunnachie on Sky Business Television discussing the mid-market (8MB)
• Australian Financial Review article on Tax 
• Deloitte R&D Tax department

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