A Comparison of National Innovation System's Efficiency in Iran and Countries Mentioned in 20-Year Perspective Document

In this article, DEA technique has been applied for the purpose of comparing national innovation system’s efficiency in Iran and countries mentioned in 20-year perspective document. According to previous studies on national innovation efficiency, the institutional variables, human capital and R&D, infrastructures, market sophistication and business sophistication have been chosen as the model’s inputs and knowledge, technology and creative outputs have been chosen as the model’s outputs. The results show that in terms of national innovation system’s efficiency the rank of Iran is 14 out of 20 countries included in DEA analyses. Furthermore, despite of rich capacity of educated human capital, the efficiency of this index is significantly low. The sensivity analysis also reveals that creative outputs are essentially important in increasing innovation efficiency. Finally according to efficiency scores, some suggestions are offered to improve strengths and weaknesses. It is worth to mention that Iran’s national innovation system’s efficiency has been investigated for the first time.