Green budgeting refers to the use of budgetary policy-making tools to progress climate and environmental objectives. This includes integrating and evaluating the climate and environmental impact of budgetary and fiscal policies and considering the path towards national and international commitments. Green budgeting is defined by four building blocks that are relevant to all stages of the budget cycle: (1) institutional arrangements; (2) methods and tools; (3) accountability and transparency; and (4) enabling environment in budgeting (OECD, 2020). In 2022, two-thirds of OECD countries surveyed had implemented green budgeting mechanisms (24 out of 36), compared to 14 out of 35 countries in 2021 (40%); almost twice as many countries implemented green budgeting in such a short period (Figure ). The eleven OECD countries that introduced green budgeting since 2021 were Chile, Finland, Greece, Israel, Korea, Lithuania, New Zealand, Slovak Republic, Spain, Switzerland and Türkiye.

Overcoming gender inequalities offers significant benefits for society and the economy. Closing gender employment gaps can strengthen economic growth and recovery. Effective implementation of gender budgeting can ensure budget policy advances gender equality objectives, such as increased workforce participation, GDP gains and improvements to fiscal sustainability (Nicol, 2022). Results from the 2022 OECD Survey on Gender Budgeting show a steady increase in the practice of gender budgeting, with 23 OECD countries having introduced measures (61%), compared to 17 in 2018 (50%) and 12 in 2016 (35%) (Figure ).

Independent fiscal institutions (IFIs) are independent public institutions with a mandate to critically assess, and in some cases provide non-partisan advice on, fiscal policy and performance. IFIs aim to promote sound fiscal policy and sustainable public finances through supporting greater transparency and accountability. There has been a surge in the number of IFIs since the global financial crisis, with 35 national institutions now in place in 29 OECD countries (six countries have more than one national IFI) (Figure ). Where IFIs are functioning well, their existence can support democratic debate in parliament, and help foster trust in fiscal policy decisions.

Given the fiscal sustainability challenge faced by health systems, an effective dialogue across government agencies responsible for the health budget is crucial. One important aspect is medium-term financial planning for health, which involves taking a strategic, multi-annual approach to budgeting, looking beyond the one-year annual budget. This includes defining priorities and allocating resources for health over a multi-annual period so that spending decisions are driven by the evolution of health needs. Successful medium-term financial planning for health offers substantial benefits for the health sector, including improving the predictability in future resource envelopes that allows health agencies to effectively plan. However, the challenge is to design a medium-term framework that allows health agencies to plan based on a reasonable assumption of available financial resources, while preserving the government’s flexibility to adjust to policy changes.