This event showcases Queensland-based researchers’ work on productivity and the economic, environmental, and social benefits of innovation and adopting new digital technologies.

Digital technologies have been said to generate environmental, social and economic values, contributing to productivity enhancement, economic growth, and social development. Newer Industry 4.0 technologies (advanced AI applications, quantum computing, blockchain, and 3D printing) offer even greater promise. However, formal statistics show that Queensland and Australia are experiencing long-term productivity decline despite the broadscale adoption of productivity-enhancing digital technologies and services over the last 30 years. Scholarly research on these issues is rare.

In practice, agencies such as CSIRO’s Data61 are frequently requested to assess and forecast the magnitude of economic and other gains from innovation and emerging digital technologies. Practitioners often use a mix of technology and economic methods in their evaluation work. For example, they examine the benefits in terms of productivity uplift, improvement in competitiveness and quality of exported goods and services, and value of new industries and job creation generated by emerging digital technologies. Other benefits, including industrial complexity, enterprise dynamism, and new path creation, are sometimes considered. Importantly, these estimations are done using blunt assumptions and broad extrapolations. Hence, an in-depth and critical analysis of these applications is needed.

This symposium will discuss research related to the following themes

· Benchmarking and measuring the socio-economic impacts of innovation, especially innovation through digital technology

· Issues around data needed to conduct better socio-economic impact assessment

· Statistical and econometric methods related to socio-economic impact assessment from new technologies

· Needed collaborations among institutions to enhance research outcomes and quality in these related themes.

Full Agenda

Time	Topic	Facilitator/ Presenter
9am	Gather for 9:30am start
9:30am	Welcome address: Solow’s Paradox and Queensland’s productivity challenge	Lucy Cameron
10am	Measuring Regional Innovation Efficiency in Queensland	Vincent Hoang
10:30am	Morning Tea
11:00am	Building a Sustainable Social Innovation Ecosystem: Insights from Australia	Hien Pham
11:30am	Determinants of innovative outcomes of firms in Regional Queensland	Anushiya Thanapalan
12:00pm	Challenges and Solutions in Tracking and Tracing the Emergence of the AI Business Ecosystem	Alexandra Bratanova
12:30pm	Lunchtime Panel Discussion on “Measuring the impacts of innovation in Queensland”	Panellists include Char-lee McLennan Nicole Blackett Lucy Cameron Moderator: Vincent Hoang
	Economics of Change
1:30pm	Data challenges in Innovation Economics	Char-lee McLennan
2:00pm	Small Business Mindset and Stage Theories	Olav Muurlink
2:30pm	Navigating Product Risk: The Role of Innovation Culture and Product Governance	Yuyu Zhang
3:00pm	Afternoon tea
3:30pm	The Effect of Carbon Price on Low Carbon Innovation	Berardo Cantone
4:00pm	Evaluating Energy Productivity and Greenhouse Gas Emissions	Hafsa Pial
4:30pm	Thanks and Closing Remarks for the Day	Vincent Hoang

If you have any further questions, please contact the the following coordinators:

Dr Lucy Cameron | Team Leader and Principal Research Consultant |Innovation Economics | CSIRO | email: lucy.cameron@data61.csiro.au

Dr Viet-Ngu Hoang | Associate Professor in Economics | QUT Faculty of Business and Law | Co-Lead of Social Systems Domain in QUT Centre for Data Science | email: vincent.hoang@qut.edu.au