Japan drops to 10th place in number of highly cited published academic papers

The National Institute of Science and Technology Policy (NISTEP) has published its Japanese Science and Technology Indicators 2021, which tracks science and technology activities of Japan and major countries with objective and quantitative data, and a benchmarking for science research in 2021, which analyzes data on the number of academic papers. In terms of the number of adjusted top-10% of highly cited papers, Japan was overtaken by India and fell to 10th place. In contrast, China overtook the United States to become first in the world.

Masatsura Igami, director of the Center for Science and Technology Foresight and Indicators, commented, "While major countries around the world are increasing government R&D investment, the number of papers has been maintained to some extent due to the sluggish growth in the number of teachers, a drop in the proportion of research hours, stagnation in the number of doctoral students, and a decline in the costs of raw materials, but this result may be due to a decline in Japan's relative share." The Science and Technology Indicators include research and development expenditure, number of researchers, number of papers, number of patents, high-tech industry trade balance ratios, and number of trade applications to countries other than the country of residence, but in 2021, Japan ranked the same as last year, and the country's ranking dropped for the number of top-10% cited papers (3-year average). Japan was in 9th place until last year, but has now fallen below India to 10th place.

Compared to 10 years ago, the number of publish papers in Japan was almost the same, going from 65,612 to 65,742, but the global share declined from 6.3% to 4.1%. In the top-10% of highly cited papers, in addition to the decline in number from 4,437 papers (4.3% share) to 3,787 papers (2.3% share), Japan's global share has decreased significantly.

In contrast, China, which surpassed the United States in terms of the number of papers in last year's survey, was ranked first in the world in terms of the number of papers. This time, China also ranked first in the category of top-10% highly cited papers. In particular, it has a high global share in materials science, chemistry, computing and mathematics, and engineering.

When looking at the number of patent families (patent applications to two or more countries), Japan has maintained the number-one position in the world for 10 years. It has a relatively high share in electrical engineering, general equipment, transportation equipment, mechanical engineering, and chemistry, but Japan's share of electrical engineering, information communications, and general equipment is declining, while China's share is increasing. The United States, which ranks second, also maintains a high share in biotechnology and medical devices, as well as biotechnology and pharmaceuticals. In terms of science linkage, which is the citation relationship between patents and papers, Japanese patent families mainly cite U.S. papers (40.6% of the total), while only 29.8% of papers cited are Japanese. In the case of the United States, 62.6% of papers cited were American, followed by U.K. papers (10.2%). On the other hand, in the case of China, 7.8% of papers cited were Chinese, which is lower than other countries.

The number of trademark applications has been attracting attention in recent years as an indicator because it is thought to further innovation by introducing new products and services. The number of trademark applications in Japan to foreign countries has been increasing, and in 2007 it was approximately 130,000, the sixth largest among major countries. In particular, there are many trademark applications related to chemicals, transportation, and logistics.

The number of foreign applications in the United States, which ranked first in the world, continued to increase, and reached about 400 000 applications in 2019. Trademark applications are at a high level in all fields, but in particular, many trademark applications are related to "management, telecommunications, real estate, and financial services" as well as "leisure, education, and training." Although China has approximately 320,000 international applications, the number of domestic applications is unusually large, representing about 4% of all applications. Many international applications have to do with home equipment, textile, clothes, and accessories. Benchmarking of scientific research is carried out once every two years, and detailed analysis of papers is carried out.

In order to increase Japan's presence, the government has implemented various policies in recent years calling for an increase in international co-authorship. As a result, the number of internationally co-authored papers increased from 19,011 to 29,158 compared with 10 years ago. This corresponded to an increase from 25.1% to 35.2% of papers. During this period, the international co-authorship rate has increased globally from 20.9% to 27.8%, but the number of internationally co-authored papers in Japan has increased at a pace higher than that.

Comparatively, Japan's position as an international co-authorship partner when viewed from the United States, which is at the center of international co-authorship, has declined over the past decade. Japan went from 6th to 8th for all fields overall, and it was only in materials science that the rank stayed high, at 5th place. Japan went from 4th to 8th in chemistry, 5th to 6th in physics, 10th to 13th in computers and mathematics, 6th to 11th in engineering, 7th to 10th in environment and geochemistry, 5th to 10th in clinical medicine, and 5th to 9th in basic life sciences.

In contrast to this result, China ranks first for international co-authorship partners in the United States for all fields other than clinical medicine. The number of Sino-American co-authored papers has increased exponentially since 2006, reaching 27.4% in 2018.

The number of internationally co-authored papers increased, but more impactfully, the number of domestic papers decreased. Because this tendency is particularly strong among the top 10%, the number of internationally co-authored papers may be increasing among researchers from the top group in Japan, while the number of researchers from the bottom group, such as the 2nd and 3rd groups, may be declining. Since 2003, the number of top-10% of highly cited papers in Japan has been decreasing, particularly for the papers of national universities and national research and development corporations. Japan's research capabilities have been severely undermined by the incorporation of independent administrative institutions into national universities and national research institutes, the reduction in the number of students, the increase of applications and evaluations due to the trade-off between stable and competitive funding, and the uncertainty of unpaid doctoral students and career paths. Expectations for a 10 trillion-yen university fund are high, but it will take several years to get on track. In the meantime, other measures must also be implemented in parallel to these efforts.