Sweden

For a highly developed industrial nation like Sweden, research is a vital investment in the future. Sweden is ahead of all other European countries in the statistics showing the percentage of the GDP spent on research as well as those illustrating the number of scientific papers published per capita.

Political framework for scientific and technological cooperation

Sweden can look back on a long history of strong support for research and development, both in the private and the public sector. There are close links between these two areas. Sweden is one of the leading countries in the world in terms of the percentage of the GDP invested in research and development: over 3% of Swedish GDP is invested in R&D.

Sweden further intensified relations with Germany in preparation for its EU accession in the first half of the nineties. Bilateral relations with Sweden are currently not formalized, but there are regular talks at working level with the Swedish ministries of education and cultural affairs, research, industry, employment, and communications.

Key areas of cooperation

Priority areas of research cooperation with Sweden are biotechnology, forest and silviculture research, nanotechnology, information and communication technologies, and ecological research. There are also interdisciplinary areas of cooperation, such as technology transfer. The focus here is on the support of SMEs and funding for technology-based start-ups.

Publikationen

Länderbericht Band 8
Schweden

Documents

Contact Persons

  • Dr. Hans-Peter Niller

    • Senior scientific officer: BeNeLux, Nordic Countries, Slovakia, Czech Republic
    • Heinrich-Konen-Str. 1
    • 53227 Bonn
    • Telefonnummer: +49 228 3821-468
    • Faxnummer: +49 228 3821-444
    • E-Mail-Adresse: hans-peter.niller@dlr.de