Scienciometric outlook of the biotechnology in the agricultural and agroindustrial sector

Abstract

This article presents Scientometrics as a major element in quantitatively addressing the study of a field of knowledge. This study seeks to combine complementarily and integrally the bibliometry with the technological outlook to obtain an image of the current state of biotechnology in a specific area. This contributes with a trend-setting in a socially relevant sector that currently addresses global challenges such as climate change and energy and food security. Through a bibliometric study, it determines the dynamics of the scientific production, key authors, country participation and language trends in the domain of Biotechnology in the agricultural and agro-industrial sectors. In addition, a technological outlook is presented, in which, based on the analysis of trends in patents, the innovative state of the area is established. The main result is associated with the dynamics of scientific production, which according to the Lotka law; states that the percentage of authors who produce N articles is inversely proportional to a power of N. The technological outlook is consistent with the Latin American studies, concluding that, despite of the increasing dynamics, there is a poor development of technology in the sector.