Last year, 3.35 billion kuna of state budget funds were spent on research and development (R&D) activities in Croatia, resulting in a share of state budget funds for R&D in GDP of 0.65 percent in 2022, according to data from the Croatian Bureau of Statistics.
The largest share of state budget funds for R&D in 2022 was allocated to the higher education sector, amounting to 2.41 billion kuna, or 72.09 percent. This was followed by the public sector with 904 million kuna or 26.98 percent, while the least funds were allocated to the private non-profit sector with 10.3 million kuna or 0.31 percent and abroad 0.13 percent, or 4.4 million kuna. The business sector received 16.4 million kuna.
According to socio-economic objectives, the most state budget funds for R&D in 2022 were spent on the goal of “general improvement of knowledge: R&D funded from higher education funds” with 2.13 billion kuna or 63.7 percent.
This was followed by the goal of ‘general improvement of knowledge: R&D funded from other sources (except higher education funds)’ with 23 percent or 771 million kuna, while the least funds were spent on the goal of “research and exploitation of space” with 170 thousand kuna or 0.01 percent.
The planned funds for R&D from the state budget in 2023 (according to the adopted budget for 2023) amounted to 3.78 billion kuna (approximately 502 million euros), of which more than half of the funds (60.65 percent) are planned for the goal of “general improvement of knowledge: R&D funded from higher education funds.”
