Last year we commissioned BiGGAR Economics to analyse the role of universities in advanced economies, in particular their role in productivity growth and the fiscal returns on investment. Reporting in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic, the findings provide a timely reminder of universities’ fundamental importance to advanced economies.

The analysis demonstrates that a thriving university sector will be an essential prerequisite to addressing Scottish and UK Government policy priorities and that investment in the sector needs to be at the centre of economic recovery and transformation plans. This will need to be the case at the national level and in every region, to ensure that the growth is inclusive spatially. For example, and more specifically, the role of the universities sector can include:

• securing and providing high quality employment;
• providing the human and intellectual capital that will be necessary for both recovery and transformation; and
• developing the high level skills required to ensure that new knowledge can be diffused throughout the economy

You can read the full report here.