OECD Regions at a Glance shows how regions and cities contribute to national economic growth and well-being. This edition updates more than 40 region-by-region indicators to assess disparities within countries and their evolution over the past 15 years. The report covers all OECD member countries and, where data are available, Brazil, People’s Republic of China, Colombia, India, Latvia, Lithuania, Peru, the Russian Federation and South Africa.

The ratification of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the UN General Assembly in September 2015, composed of 17 goals and 169 targets, set a global agenda for achieving environmental sustainability, social inclusion and economic development by 2030. They provide a set of ambitions to whose realization all countries must contribute. One of the challenges is adjusting our focus, looking beyond national approaches to the powerful role that regions and cities play. The global agenda will require local data, the engagement of many stakeholders and all levels of government, and improved government capacity to steer and manage the delivery of public policies for inclusive growth.

For policy makers and citizens alike, thinking globally increasingly requires looking hard at the many different local realities within and across countries. A thorough assessment of whether life is getting better requires a wide range of measures that are able to show not only what conditions people experience, but where they experience them. OECD data show remarkably high disparities in people’s living conditions across regions and cities: for example, there is a 20 percentage point difference among unemployment rates between regions within Italy, Spain and Turkey, comparable to the difference between the national unemployment rate of Greece and that of Norway. And life expectancy varies by 8 years among all OECD countries, but by 11 years across Canada’s provinces and by 6 years among states in Australia and in the United States.

Regions at a Glance 2016 addresses two questions: