The National Survey of Research and Experimental Development (R&D) is undertaken annually to monitor the country's investments in R&D. The survey provides information on R&D funding and performance in South Africa. The data help to profile the size and shape of the R&D landscape and support the production of statistics for use in system-level planning, monitoring and evaluation. The 2010/11 R&D survey recorded that South Africa spent R20.254 billion as gross expenditure on research and development (GERD), a nominal decrease of 3.3% from the R20.254 billion recorded for 2009/10. With the GERD as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) at 0.76%, the findings indicate a fourth consecutive decline from 0.93% of 2007/08, 0.92% of 2008/09 and 0.87% in 2009/10. These declines are occurring in an environment of modest increases in GDP.