A Eurostat report from 4 August shows that, in Luxembourg last year, €661.60 was allocated per person by the government for R&D.

This number was comfortably the highest in the EU, with second place being Denmark (€529.10) and third place Germany (€517.60).

At the bottom of the chart were Romania (€17.60) and Bulgaria (€27.3).

The EU average was €262.70 per person, up by 49.2% compared to ten years prior and 5.4% compared to 2021.

As for what the money was spent on--across the EU--the report found that over half (52%) of it went towards the advancement of general knowledge (either via public general university funds or via other sources). The next biggest category was industrial production (10.2%), followed by health (8.3%), space exploitation and exploration (5.9%) and energy (4.7%).

In Luxembourg

Government budget allocations for R&D in the grand duchy stand at €1.7bn for the 2022-2025 period, which includes €219m for the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (List), €182.54m for the Luxembourg Institute of Health and €62.08m for the Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (Liser).

In June, results of an external evaluation of the three research institutions were published. Among the generally positive findings came the observation that reliance on public funding was, perhaps, too high.

R&D funding is undoubtedly strong in the grand duchy, but, as we previously wrote about, Luxembourg’s situation is also unique.