Browse by: "2024"

This paper studies the differences between the organisation of budget management in selected government administrations in the Western Balkans and the Republic of Moldova and good practice across the European Union (EU). It observes that the ministry of finance (MoF) in these administrations typically engages in direct budget negotiations with a large number of budget organisations. This practice is in stark contrast with the budgeting approach observed in the EU, where the MoF only deals directly with government ministries and a limited number of constitutional bodies. The paper highlights the adverse consequences for the strategic role of the MoF for fiscal policy, the accountability of line ministries for budgeting and service delivery in their sector and the introduction of modern public financial management instruments such as medium-term budgeting and performance-based budgeting. This paper recommends that governments reduce the number of first-level budget organisations and give line ministries more responsibility for budget management in their sector. At the same time, the paper recommends strengthening line ministries’ accountability for budget management towards the parliament.

This policy paper aims to strengthen the capacities of law enforcement authorities in Asia and the Pacific to combat corruption and fraud during emergencies. It builds on lessons learnt from recent emergencies, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, to improve the preparedness of law enforcement authorities for future health, environmental or economic crises. The paper takes stock of the challenges law enforcement practitioners face in detecting, investigating and prosecuting corruption and fraud during emergencies, and highlights good practices and provides practical guidance for law enforcement.

High energy prices and major geopolitical shifts, paired with an accelerated global digitalisation of industries of economies worldwide and rising pressure to achieve sustainability goals, have created new uncertainties for German SMEs. Successfully navigating these changes, and in turn, seizing new growth opportunities, will require sustained and significant investments. Access to an appropriate and diverse set of financing sources will be critical. This paper examines current policy practices to help German SMEs access finance, with a particular focus on efforts to link growth to sustainability goals in the national policy mix. It provides a brief overview of the German SME landscape, including key strengths and challenges in the context of the twin transition, and discusses the financing instruments available to small businesses in the country, including those with growth ambitions. It then analyses federal government efforts to unleash finance for innovation, investment, and network expansion as drivers of SME growth, and how these efforts compare to other OECD countries.

Les technologies émergentes peuvent être source d’avantages sans précédent dans les domaines de la santé, de l’énergie, du climat, des systèmes alimentaires et de la biodiversité. Cela dit, ces technologies et leur convergence présentent parfois des risques pour la vie privée, la sécurité, l’équité et les droits humains. Cette dualité impose aux pouvoirs publics de mieux anticiper les bouleversements et de créer les conditions requises pour que le développement technologique favorise la prospérité économique, la résilience, la sécurité et la recherche de solutions aux problèmes sociétaux. Fondé sur les travaux antérieurs et les instruments juridiques de l’OCDE, le présent cadre fournit aux pouvoirs publics, aux autres acteurs de l’innovation et à la société dans son ensemble les moyens d’anticiper les problèmes de gouvernance, de les traiter en amont et de renforcer les capacités dans ce domaine à plus long terme afin d’orienter plus efficacement l’innovation. Le principe de « gouvernance anticipative des technologies » sur lequel il repose est composé de cinq éléments interdépendants et outils de gouvernance connexes : (1) des valeurs directrices, (2) le renseignement stratégique, (3) la mobilisation des parties prenantes, (4) une réglementation agile et (5) la coopération internationale. La manière dont chacun de ces éléments s’applique dépend du contexte dans lequel s’inscrivent les technologies émergentes.

De multiples crises provoquent des turbulences, de l'instabilité et de l'insécurité dans les sociétés contemporaines, avec des répercussions sur les économies, l'environnement, la politique et les affaires mondiales. Pour apporter une réponse efficace, les gouvernements devront être plus ambitieux et agir avec plus d'urgence dans leurs politiques en matière de science, de technologie et d'innovation (STI) afin de relever les défis mondiaux. Des investissements soutenus et une plus grande directivité des activités de recherche et d'innovation sont nécessaires, et ils devraient coïncider avec une réévaluation des systèmes et des politiques STI pour s'assurer qu'ils sont à même de contribuer aux changements visés. Ce document d'orientation fournit un cadre pour aider les gouvernements à procéder à ces évaluations. Il identifie six orientations politiques STI pour les changements transformateurs qui devraient guider ces évaluations. Il applique ces orientations à de multiples domaines de la politique STI, notamment le financement de la R&D, le personnel de recherche et d'innovation et la coopération internationale en matière de R&D, et propose aux responsables publics et aux autres acteurs concernés un cadre pour la formulation et la mise en oeuvre de réformes STI qui accéléreront les changements transformateurs.

This analytical report, the last in a series of four, was prepared by the OECD Higher Education Policy Team as part of the Education and Innovation Practice Community (EIPC), an action of the European Union’s New European Innovation Agenda, flagship 4 on “Fostering, attracting and retaining deep tech talent”. EIPC seeks to bring together peers from policy and practice to advance understanding of the competencies that can trigger and shape innovation for the digital and green transitions, and the mechanisms through which higher education can contribute to their development across three stages of education: secondary education; higher education; and adult upskilling and reskilling. Drawing on module B of the Higher Education Policy Survey 2022 and case studies, this report examines how public authorities can promote upskilling and reskilling in higher education to contribute to the green and digital transitions. It first offers a typology of the higher education-based upskilling and reskilling offer observed in OECD countries before describing four key action areas: setting system-wide strategies; supporting provision; attracting and supporting learners; and securing industry and employer engagement.

Over the past two decades, the use of research in educational practice has emerged as a policy imperative in many OECD countries. However, concerns about the significant gap between research evidence and practice are persistent. This working paper delves into the role of research-practice partnerships in bridging this divide. It critically evaluates common assumptions associated with such partnerships through an overview of research, insights from recent OECD data, and importantly, through in-depth case studies. These illustrate partnerships between education researchers and school practitioners in three countries: Norway, the United States, and Germany. They examine the conditions under which these can achieve an impact on both research and practice, and illuminate challenges and open questions associated with these collaborations. The paper aims to inform policy makers and researchers alike on the potential and limitations of research-practice partnerships.

The global challenge of the green transition, aimed at achieving net-zero emissions, is expected to reshape the labour market significantly. This shift presents both economic and redistributive challenges, with a particular concern for young people entering the job market. Education plays a crucial role in preparing students with the knowledge, skills, attitudes, and values needed for green careers. However, there is a gap in how well schools are preparing students for these opportunities. Effective career guidance systems are essential to serve as bridges between students' interests and labour market demands. This study examined 87 programmes within primary and secondary education across 20 OECD countries, aimed at enhancing students' understanding of and progression towards green careers. These programmes, though not exhaustive, provide valuable insights into the conceptualisation and implementation of green guidance programmes, which are expected to become increasingly important in the future.

Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) could play a pivotal role in the pursuit of climate objectives. SMEs have a significant carbon footprint on aggregate, but they can also contribute to reaching net zero through their innovations and commitment to the use of environmentally friendly practices. This study develops a novel metric to identify environmental engagement, also referred to as “greening”. The study harnesses the power of machine-learning and analyses the content of over one million websites of firms from 15 OECD countries encompassing about 10 billion words. Greening is identified based on firms’ self-declared information about products or processes on their websites. The resulting indicator is then evaluated considering firms’ characteristics. The results show that: (1) About one-third of SMEs are environmentally engaged, albeit with considerable variations across countries; (2) Greening SMEs are more productive, pay higher wages and their sales grow faster than non-greening SMEs; (3) Solar energy is the most cited action among greening SMEs, followed by recycling and energy efficiency, (4) Sectors with higher greenhouse gas emission reduction over the past decade also display higher levels of environmental engagement.

This paper presents a technical assessment of nature-related risks within the Hungarian economy and financial system. The study draws upon the OECD Supervisory Framework to (i) prioritise various nature-related risks by conducting an impact and dependency assessment, identifying key economic sectors, and pinpointing the critical natural capital assets that are most crucial to the financial system; (ii) assess the direct and indirect economic impact of three exploratory scenarios on possible acute nature-related shocks using input-output analysis; (iii) explore the different financial risk channels through which economic risks stemming from nature-related losses may be transmitted within the Hungarian financial system; and (iv) provide supervisory recommendations based on the results.

Data portability enhances access to and sharing of data across digital services and platforms. It can empower users to play a more active role in the re-use of their data and can help stimulate competition and innovation by fostering interoperability while reducing switching costs and lock-in effects. However, the effectiveness of data portability in enhancing competition depends on the terms and conditions of data transfer and the extent to which competitors can make use of the data effectively. Additionally, there are potential downsides: data portability measures may unintentionally stifle competition in fast-evolving markets where interoperability requirements may disproportionately burden SMEs and start-ups. Data portability can also increase digital security and privacy risks by enabling data transfers to multiple destinations. This note presents the following five dimensions essential for designing and implementing data portability frameworks: sectoral scope; beneficiaries; type of data; legal obligations; and operational modality.

When and how did budgeting as we know it come to be? This inquiry yields some surprising answers. The budget system evolved as an integral part of the development of the modern democratic state, and hence replicates within itself the core principle of separation of powers. This process first took place in England over some five centuries. Once established, however, the budget system spread quite rapidly: most Western countries adopted it in the nineteenth century; the rest of the world, in the latter half of the twentieth. The propagation was so successful that virtually all countries currently subscribe to one same model of budgeting. Underneath the minor cosmetic differences, the basic framework of allocating budgetary authorities between the government and the legislature, and the principles that govern the interactions between them, are identical among virtually all countries, including even those that subscribe to different notions of government than Western democracy.

This report examines public financial management in Moldova, with a particular focus on budget preparation, execution and reporting. Moldova has already implemented the foundations of modern budget arrangements, and has made good progress in aligning with the OECD Recommendation on Budgetary Governance. The most significant reforms have been the introduction of new budget legislation, greater transparency of budget arrangements, a medium-term budget framework, performance budgeting, reforms to capital expenditure management, and piloting spending reviews. This report focuses on ways to strengthen existing arrangements to improve the quality of the country’s system of budgetary governance.

Digital transformation shapes how individuals interact with each other and the world, offering opportunities to enhance people’s enjoyment of human rights while also creating new risks and exacerbating existing ones. This report explores how human rights are exercised, protected and promoted in the digital age. By examining this topic from three perspectives – rights, technological developments, and policy developments – the paper supports policy makers in shaping digital transformation so that it puts people at the centre.

False and misleading content online poses significant risks to the well-being of people and society, but a lack of cross-country comparable evidence persists. This paper contributes to the literature by presenting the OECD Truth Quest Survey methodology and key findings. This survey assesses whether some types of content are more easily distinguishable as false and misleading than others and whether the theme plays any role in its detection. It provides evidence about whether AI-generated content is easier to identify than human-generated content as well as insights into the effects of AI labelling. It further presents information on people’s behaviour as they interact with false and misleading content and their perceptions about their ability to detect it. The cross-country comparable data from the survey will help policy makers better design media literacy strategies, programmes and related policies to address the negative effects of such content.

This paper applies Machine learning techniques to Google Trends data to provide real-time estimates of national average subjective well-being among 38 OECD countries since 2010. We make extensive usage of large custom micro databases to enhance the training of models on carefully pre-processed Google Trends data. We find that the best one-year-ahead prediction is obtained from a meta-learner that combines the predictions drawn from an Elastic Net with and without interactions, from a Gradient-Boosted Tree and from a Multi-layer Perceptron. As a result, across 38 countries over the 2010-2020 period, the out-of-sample prediction of average subjective well-being reaches an R2 of 0.830.

This paper presents the 2024 version of the OECD International Transport and Insurance Cost of Merchandise Trade (ITIC) database, offering insights into bilateral international transport and insurance costs across more than 200 countries and their trading partners. Covering over 1 200 products from 1995 to 2022, the database combines officially reported information with estimates based on a gravity model. The model operates at a detailed six-digit Harmonised System (HS) product code level, subsequently aggregated into four-digit HS product code categories for analysis. The findings of ITIC 2024 indicate that the COVID-19 pandemic had a more significant impact on international transport and insurance costs for trade between countries located in different continents compared to trade between partners within the same continent. Additionally, they confirm that trade costs have exhibited a declining trend during the study period, and that the CIF/FOB margins vary among different reporting entities, trading partners, and products.

The results of the PISA 2022 financial literacy assessment show that many 15-year-olds should be better prepared for their financial future, as they are not able to apply their financial knowledge to real-life situations. In every participating country and economy, students from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds performed significantly worse than their advantaged peers. PISA data also show that students who discuss money matters with their parents, and those who make autonomous decisions about how to spend their money, achieve higher levels of financial literacy. This PISA in Focus examines the proportion of students who do not achieve baseline financial literacy and explores the links between socio-economic backgrounds, parental interactions and financial literacy performance.

In the wake of significant price increases in 2021 and 2022, countries introduced new or revised their fertiliser policies, further complicating the policy landscape in a highly concentrated market susceptible to supply disruptions. This report takes stock of the variety of policies in place and develops a framework for their classification and analysis. Key insights include the evolution and composition of farmer support estimates for mineral fertiliser use, the generally low or zero import tariffs reflecting high import dependence, and the non-transparent and frequently changing export restrictions imposed by major exporters. The analysis also shows a clear shift in policies from supporting mineral fertilisers to reducing their use or supporting organic fertiliser production and use. Yet, despite the potential of organic fertilisers, expanding their use and development will require substantial investment, changes in farm management, and policy adjustments.