The Importance of Science, Technology and Innovation in the Green Growth and Sustainable Development Goals of Colombia

Green growth and sustainable development goals (SDGs) are two strategies to improve the productivity and competitiveness of countries with respect to environmental protection. In these strategies, science, technology and innovation (STI) plays an important role in generating new knowledge. Colombia is a highly diversified country that is currently seeking to promote green growth initiatives and the SDGs through five axes: policy, new economic opportunities from the sustainable use of natural resources, the efficient use of natural capital and energy in production, business and human competences and capacities in STI. In this context, this study seeks to analyse the main contributions and adequate measures that determine the relationships between green growth, SDGs and STI in Colombia over recent years using different econometric models. The results of this study suggest the importance of STI in promoting green growth and achieving SDGs. In other words, higher investments in STI promote lower pollution and higher productivity, competitiveness and development, and new knowledge and technologies are found to be important to increasing the sustainable use of natural resources in productive processes. These results suggest policy implications with regard to energy use and conservation, resource efficiency, and the reduction of pollution. It is important to formulate and frequently measure the indicators of STI related to green growth and SDGs from a baseline, as this will allow us to analyse improvements in competitiveness and productivity from a sustainable development perspective.