South Korea Ranks 5th in ‘Engineer Output per Capita Beating China

South Korea has been shown to produce more engineers per capita annually than China. However, the absolute numbers show a difference of about ten times.

On the 28th (local time), Insider Monkey, a U.S. investment specialist media, released a report titled “Engineer Numbers by Country: Top 20 Countries”. Insider Monkey used UNESCO statistics to compile this report. The top 10 countries were determined using annual statistics of graduates in the fields of engineering, manufacturing, and construction, while the next 10 countries were determined using distribution statistics of higher education graduates by major.

South Korea ranked fifth, following Russia, the United States, Iran, and Japan, with an annual output of 148,857 graduates in the engineering field.

Insider Monkey analyzed South Korea as “famous for advanced technology companies like Samsung, LG, and Hyundai, which provide excellent opportunities for engineering experts” and said that “South Korea’s focus on innovation is revealed through massive government investment plans for nurturing green and digital technologies, such as the ‘Korean version of the New Deal.’ It is one of the world’s top engineering countries.”

China ranked sixth, following South Korea. As there was no UNESCO data for China in 2016, they referred to data from the World Economic Forum and others. The World Economic Forum claimed that China is producing 4.7 million graduates in the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) field, whereas U.S. government agencies reported it was about 1.6 million in 2014.

India followed next. With 34% of students choosing the STEM field, India emerged as the country producing the highest number of STEM graduates worldwide.

The global engineering services industry has grown at an average annual rate of 3.9% over the past five years and is expected to exceed $1.7 trillion by 2023. The industry expects that sufficient opportunities will be provided to engineering companies due to the ongoing economic growth, primarily in Asia and North America, and it is forecasted to continue growing steadily over the next five years.

By. Sung Il Hong