Elsevier

Research Policy

Volume 13, Issue 5, October 1984, Pages 303-310
Research Policy

India's technological capability: An analysis of its achievements and limits

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Abstract

Four types of technological capability are distinguished: capability in the purchase of technology, plant operation, duplication and expansion, and innovation. In the purchase of technology, Indian buyers are observed to be less inhibited by lack of knowledge as by the inability to attract technology sellers of their choice; the difficulty becomes greater if the buyers become significant exporters. The scaling down of plants and the adaptation of processes to locally available materials have called for local technological development, which has been more successful in engineering than in the process industries. The engineering industry was built up through blanket import substitution, whose cost was paid by the investing industries in the form of high capital costs and low quality of equipment. But in industries where a large number of plants was built, teething problems in plant construction were overcome, and cheap and reliable equipment came to be made which formed the basis of India's technology exports in the late seventies.

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This paper is based on the findings of the joint project on technology development and policy of the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations and the National Council of Applied Economic Research, Delhi. It is a revised and shortened version of a paper presented at the Workshop on Indigenous Technological Capability held at the University of Edinburgh in June 1982. The complete version is available from the author (Energy Research Group, 60 Queen St., Ottawa K1G 3H9, Canada).

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