South Korea ranked top among the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries in terms of research and development spending as a proportion of gross domestic product, a report showed Thursday.

According to the OECD report on the global state of science, technology and industry, Korea has superseded Israel as the world’s most R&D intensive country, spending 4.29 percent of GDP for this purpose in 2014.

OECD countries spent an average of 2.37 percent of their GDP, the same level as a year earlier.

The report on 41 countries, including seven major emerging economies and 34 OECD members, showed that Finland and Japan came in second and third, respectively, with 4.11 percent and 3.58 percent.

Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Austria and Taiwan were also high performers with over 3 percent of their GDP invested in research.

In terms of the total expenditure volume, the U.S. spent the most, investing $450 billion in 2014.

China spent about $360 billion while Korea spent $72.3 billion, about a sixth of the amount spent by the U.S. and a fifth of what China put in.

Of the amount, government investment accounted for 23 percent, less than the OECD average of 28 percent.

The report also showed that Samsung Electronics was the world’s second-biggest corporate spender on R&D, following Volkswagen, which kept its top position for the third consecutive year.

By Park Han-na (hnpark@heraldcorp.com)