Skills shortage threatens Sweden’s competitiveness

01 Jan Skills shortage threatens Sweden’s competitiveness

Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering (IVA)
2021

Sweden is a country with many global and world-leading companies. Staying at the forefront of an accelerating green and digital transformation requires a strong commitment to research and development. With the R&D Barometer IVA is for the third consecutive year investigating what the Swedish research and development climate is like. The barometer is based on a questionnaire answered by 100 R&D managers in Swedish industry, ten of whom were interviewed in depth. Together, the companies in the survey have around 56,000 R&D employees, which corresponds to 74% of all R&D employees in Swedish industry.In summary, IVA’s R&D Barometer 2021 shows that the Swedish R&D climate is good, but that it has gradually deteriorated since previous years’ surveys. The business community continues to find that shortages of skill are the biggest threats to Swedish companies’ R&D, while having employees with the right skill set is considered the most important factor for success. To strengthen the Swedish R&D climate, many executives see that the ability to recruit from abroad needs to be improved, and that tax policies should be adapted to attract foreign experts to come and stay in Sweden. In addition, cooperation between companies and universities needs to be strengthened. The report is available in Swedish.