R&D Statistics

Singapore measures national research and development (R&D) performance primarily through the National Survey of Research, Innovation and Enterprise (RIE), conducted annually by the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) under the Statistics Act 1973 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE, accessed 11 Aug 2026). The survey publishes Gross Expenditure on R&D (GERD), Business Expenditure on R&D (BERD), Public Expenditure on R&D (PUBERD), R&D manpower, and related intensity ratios for a named calendar reference year. As of 11 August 2026, the latest published survey issue on ASTAR's survey page covers reference year 2023 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE, latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). This article explains how those statistics are defined, the latest verified dated headline figures with denominators, and why they must not be confused with multi-year Research, Innovation and Enterprise budget envelopes. Institutional roles of ASTAR versus the National Research Foundation (NRF) are covered in astar and public research; compact dated anchors sit in rd expenditure anchors.

How Singapore reports national R&D

Singapore's National Survey of RIE is the primary statistical source for national R&D expenditure and manpower. ASTAR conducts the survey annually; SingStat and data.gov.sg redistribute selected series under Industry → Research and Development, with footnotes stating that the data come from ASTAR's survey of government, public research institutes, institutes of higher learning, and the private sector (A*STAR National Survey of RIE, accessed Aug 2026; data.gov.sg R&D expenditure dataset, accessed Aug 2026). Redistributed tables can lag the latest survey PDF, so for the newest reference year prefer the National Survey of RIE publication linked from A*STAR's survey page (A*STAR National Survey of RIE, accessed Aug 2026).

Survey R&D follows the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Frascati Manual idea of creative work undertaken on a systematic basis to increase the stock of knowledge and use that knowledge to devise new applications, covering basic research, applied research, and experimental development (SingStat R&D table, accessed 11 Aug 2026; A*STAR National Survey of RIE, latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). For this survey, the scope extends to science and technology R&D only and excludes the social sciences and humanities (A*STAR National Survey of RIE, latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Headline expenditure measures are intramural — R&D performed within the organisation during the reporting period — not every grant paid to another performer (A*STAR National Survey of RIE, latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026).

Institutional sectors in the survey and redistributed tables are: the private sector (business enterprises, excluding institutes of higher learning); the government sector (ministries, statutory boards, and public research institutes, excluding institutes of higher learning); and institutes of higher learning (including universities and polytechnics) (data.gov.sg R&D expenditure dataset, accessed Aug 2026; A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). GERD is the national sum; BERD is private-sector performance; PUBERD is public-sector performance (government sector plus institutes of higher learning and other publicly funded research organisations as defined in the survey) (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Amounts are in Singapore dollars.

GERD, BERD, and R&D intensity in 2023

For calendar year 2023, the National Survey of RIE reports Singapore's GERD at S$13,746.9 million, up 8.4% from S$12,676.2 million in 2022 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Using GDP at current market prices of S$678.7 billion for 2023 (figures the survey states were extracted from the Singapore Department of Statistics in December 2025), GERD was 2.0% of GDP, up from 1.8% in 2022 when GDP was S$701.8 billion (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). The intensity rise therefore reflects both higher GERD and a lower GDP denominator in that vintage comparison; always pair the percentage with the reference year and the GDP series used (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026).

Of 2023 GERD, BERD was S$8,956.0 million (1.3% of GDP) and PUBERD was S$4,790.9 million (0.7% of GDP) (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). BERD rose 10.2% from S$8,130.1 million in 2022; PUBERD rose 5.4% from S$4,546.1 million (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). The survey states that for every S$1 of public-sector research spending, businesses spent S$1.87 in 2023 (BERD/PUBERD ratio 1.87, up from 1.79 in 2022) (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). From 2013 to 2023, GERD's compound annual growth rate was 6.4%, from a 2013 GERD base of S$7,393.5 million against GDP of S$384.9 billion (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Quote these levels with the 2023 reference year; they are not a 2026 run-rate and are not interchangeable with RIE plan envelopes. Canonical rows for reuse are in rd expenditure anchors.

Business and public R&D performers in the survey

In 2023, 1,030 private-sector companies reported that they performed R&D in Singapore, accounting for the S$8,956.0 million BERD total (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Within private-sector cost types, capital expenditure rose sharply to S$1,232.8 million in 2023 from S$796.2 million in 2022; manpower expenditure was S$3,874.6 million and other operating expenditure S$3,848.6 million (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). By type of R&D activity in the private sector, experimental development (S$4,346.9 million) remained larger than applied research (S$2,988.5 million) and basic research (S$1,616.9 million) in 2023 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Electronics was the largest private-sector field in the survey's science-and-technology taxonomy at S$4,878.4 million in 2023, ahead of info-communication and media technology, precision and transport engineering, biomedical sciences, and chemicals (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Sector narratives for manufacturing and biomedical industry strategy belong in electronics and semiconductors and biomedical and pharma; those articles do not replace the survey's dated BERD field totals.

On the public side, 60 public institutions — including government agencies, public research institutes, institutes of higher learning, academic medical centres, hospitals, and other publicly funded research organisations — reported PUBERD of S$4,790.9 million in 2023 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Public manpower expenditure was S$2,675.1 million, other operating expenditure S$1,777.1 million, and capital expenditure S$338.8 million (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Public R&D is not the same as ASTAR alone: ASTAR institutes are major public performers inside the government/public-research-institute grouping, but PUBERD also includes universities, polytechnics, hospitals, and other agencies (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026; astar and public research). Do not treat an A*STAR institute list as a substitute for national GERD or PUBERD.

R&D manpower and researcher intensity

R&D manpower in the survey covers persons engaged in R&D as at the last day of the reporting year, including researchers, full-time postgraduate research students, technicians, and support staff (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). In 2023, total R&D manpower was 61,693 persons, up 3.5% from 59,609 in 2022 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Research Scientists and Engineers (RSEs) — university-degree researchers excluding full-time postgraduate research students — numbered 44,368, or 71.9% of R&D jobs associated with the survey's manpower count (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Total researchers including full-time postgraduate research students were 53,317 in 2023 (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026).

Researcher intensity uses full-time equivalence (FTE) relative to the labour force. The survey reports Singapore's labour force at 3.94 million in 2023 (up from 3.75 million in 2022) and researcher FTEs at 50,345 (up from 48,599), giving 12.8 researcher FTEs per 1,000 labour-force persons in 2023 (12.9 in 2022) (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Headcount and FTE answer different questions; do not treat 61,693 persons as identical to 50,345 researcher FTEs (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). Among RSEs in 2023, Singapore citizens and permanent residents numbered 31,674 and foreign (non-PR) RSEs 12,694; female RSEs were 14,222, or 32.1% of all RSEs (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026).

GERD versus RIE budget envelopes

National R&D statistics and national RIE budget envelopes answer different questions. GERD/BERD/PUBERD measure intramural R&D performed in Singapore in a past calendar year by surveyed organisations, expressed in Singapore dollars and often as a share of that year's GDP (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). By contrast, Research, Innovation and Enterprise plans are multi-year government funding and priority frameworks set through NRF processes. NRF is a department within the Prime Minister's Office that develops policies, plans, and strategies for research, innovation, and enterprise and funds strategic initiatives (NRF, accessed Aug 2026). At the 5 December 2025 launch of RIE2030, the Government announced investment of S$37 billion over five years from April 2026 — described as about one per cent of GDP — continuing the sequence of five-year RIE plans (PMO, 5 Dec 2025, accessed Aug 2026).

Those figures are not interchangeable. A five-year RIE envelope is not an annual GERD total; GERD includes private-sector BERD that is not the same thing as government RIE appropriations; and RIE spending is not confined to A*STAR (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026; PMO, 5 Dec 2025, accessed Aug 2026; astar and public research). The 2023 survey itself notes the RIE2030 announcement and the S$37 billion commitment for 2026–2030 while still reporting calendar-year 2023 performance statistics (A*STAR National Survey of RIE — latest issue: 2023, accessed 11 Aug 2026). For who performs public research versus who owns national RIE policy, use astar and public research; for dated GERD/BERD intensity rows, use rd expenditure anchors.