The Research and Development sector is created by the institutions involved in activities of increasing the knowledge and exploring new applications. Products created in the sector are innovations which are a factor of rapid economic development. The problem of R&D sector is still a low level of funding, especially in the private sector. The number of patents and commercialization of solutions is small compared to other European countries. Enterprises do not use opportunities to cooperate with

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... niversities and other research institutions, and opportunities for the development of R&D sector, taking into account the potential of the existing academic and research institutes, are still huge. This is why the aim of this study is the analyze of the R&D sector structure and a short description of research and development activities in the Podlaskie Province. The level and method of financing the R&D sector in Poland is characterized by a relatively low share of expenditure on R&D activities, the domination of the public sector financed and a low spending on applied research and development work. Poland is among the group of countries with the highest share of basic research in the overall structure of research.