Facts and figures

Poland has a history of pioneering education and research. The country’s oldest educational institution, Jagiellonian University in Kraków¹, was founded in 1364; its largest is the University of Warsaw². Today, there are around 350 higher education institutions, with more than 1.2 million students enrolled³. Around 44% of young adults in Poland attain a tertiary education⁴, and biotechnology is one of the most popular fields of study⁵.

In 2019, 271,000 people in Poland were involved in R&D work⁶. There are specialized research institutions, such as the scientific institutes of the Polish Academy of Sciences⁷ and Łukasiewicz Research Network institutes, which connect science and economy⁸. The European Patent Office granted 278 patents with first patentees residing in Poland in 2020⁹, and the Polish Patent Office granted 2,308 patents for inventions in the country¹⁰.

Scientific research in Poland has benefited from increases in investment. Gross expenditure on research and development (GERD) more than doubled between 2005 and 2019, to 1.32%¹¹. The main sectors financing GERD were business enterprise, providing 50.7%, and the Polish government, providing 38.8%. Public and private science spending in 2019 exceeded 6.5 billion euros.

Life scientists in Poland have access to a variety of national funding options, for example through the National Science Centre or the Foundation for Polish Science. They also receive funding through Horizon 2020 projects, European Research Council grants, and Marie Skłodowska-Curie¹² Actions as well as EMBO¹³.