Food manufacturing R&D in the United States is near the average for OECD countries
- by ERS
- 8/20/2012

Research intensity in food manufacturing varies considerably across countries. For the United States, research intensity was 1.53 percent of food industry GDP during 2000-2007, about the average for all OECD countries. Among OECD countries, Switzerland, Denmark, Norway, and the Netherlands have the highest research intensity in food manufacturing. This partly reflects the presence of large, multinational, and R&D-intensive food companies in these countries, such as Nestlé (Switzerland) and Unilever (Netherlands). These companies likely dominate national totals for these countries, even though some of the R&D by these companies may be conducted outside their home country. Generally, research intensity in the food industry is considerably less than that in manufacturing industries as a whole. For the 2000-2007 period, research intensity in all manufacturing industries among OECD countries was 7.6 percent, compared with 1.6 percent in the food manufacturing industry. This chart is found in the ERS report, Research Investments and Market Structure in the Food Processing, Agricultural Input, and Biofuel Industries Worldwide, ERR-130, December 2011.