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Abstract
Objective of the paper is to verify which are the determinants of innovations in the
Italian food industry and which role R&D networking, through the cooperative nature of
firm, plays among these determinants.
The data used are the 9th (2001-2003) wave of Capitalia surveys based on a
representative sample of manufacturing firms with information on firm characteristics,
employee education levels, innovation and R&D investments.
The approach is a bivariate probit analysis where the two dependent variables are the
presence of firm R&D and of innovations and the independent variables are firm
characteristics.
The results of the analysis show that, among the determinants of firm R&D intra
moenia and of firm innovations in the Italian food industry for the years 2001-03, the
presence of subsidies for R&D extra moenia, is the most significant variable with the highest
marginal effect while the cooperative variable turns out to be positive and significant (6%)
after including relative input prices.