We’re pleased to announce the release of a major preprint from Michiel van Dijk and colleagues, supported by the BrightSpace Horizon Europe project. Published on Research Square, the article “A global database of public agricultural R&D investment: 1960–2022” introduces GRAPE, a harmonized dataset covering public agricultural research and development (R&D) personnel and expenditures across 190 countries over six decades.
📊 What GRAPE Offers
GRAPE — Global Research on Agriculture: Personnel & Expenditures — combines data from institutional sources including OECD, Eurostat, ASTI, and country statistics, applying standardized classifications and imputation methods to fill historical gaps. It provides consistent annual time series (1960–2022) on both R&D spending and research staff numbers—allowing analysts to track long-term trends in public agricultural innovation, assess productivity impacts, and benchmark national efforts against global targets.
🌍 Why It Matters for Policy & Modelling
Public investment in agricultural R&D has a high return on productivity and climate resilience yet has historically been uneven and under-documented. GRAPE fills a vital information gap, enabling policy-makers and researchers to monitor investment trends, evaluate output impacts, and guide future R&D strategies aligned with EU priorities. As part of the BrightSpace initiative, this preprint strengthens our shared mission to enhance evidence-based modelling — supporting CAP and agri-food system transitions with rigorous, globally comprehensive data.
🔗 Read the full preprint and explore the GRAPE database:
- Preprint article: A global database of public agricultural R&D investment: 1960–2022”
- GRAPE dataset on Zenodo
Source: WSER
