Browse by: "A"

Asian-Pacific countries have made significant efforts to address weaknesses in their procurement frameworks and practices. To support these efforts and to assist the ADB/OECD Anti-Corruption Initiative’s 28 member countries in strengthening their public-procurement mechanisms, the Initiative conducted a Regional Seminar on Fighting Bribery in Public Procurement in November 2007.  This volume compiles the experience that experts from Asian and Pacific countries – as well as beyond the region – shared during the seminar. It is addressed to policy makers and experts who wish to learn from other countries’ experiences in strengthening frameworks to protect public procurement from bribery and corruption risks.

The Report assesses the main issues arising from Chile’s merger control regime and proposes recommendations for improvement under OECD standards and other international best practices.

Biodurability of nanomaterials (NMs) through dissolution and enzymatic biodegradation or chemical disintegration is an important property that needs to be investigated for their potential to cause harm to humans and the environment. NMs may therefore be differentiated based on their biodurability between those that are amenable and those that are resistant to dissolution, biodegradation and/or disintegration. This document compiles the relevant information on the biodurability of the pristine and functionalised nanomaterials in biological and environmental media in vitro and in vivo, as well as describes brief methods for measuring the stability and halftimes of nanomaterials.

Bringing the results of economic appraisals and environmental assessments before technical and political decision-makers in ways that are clear, concise and transparent is essential if planning and decision making procedures are to achieve a sustainable transport system. This report makes recommendations for good practice in the transport sector on the basis of reviews of recent experience in infrastructure planning and policy development in seven countries.

This volume is the fourth of a series devoted to major policy issues in insurance. It comprises an in-depth analysis on the assessment and the management of the major technical and financial risks insurance companies have to face. It responds to the growing concerns of economic, financial, political and social actors in the insurance market. It addresses the ever increasing risk exposure of insurance companies that could endanger their financial health. This book constitutes a unique reference work for the attention of both OECD countries and emerging economies.

Disasters disrupt socio-economic activities and cause substantial damage. Yet, their full economic impact remains largely unknown, especially the cost of smaller disasters and indirect impacts such as those due to business disruptions. Similarly, little information exists on the total amount of public resources that countries devote to disaster risk management. Reliable, comprehensive and comparable data on the economic impact of disasters as well as on public spending on disaster management and risk prevention are essential for developing effective disaster risk management policies. This report provides an overview of countries' efforts to improve the quality and quantity of information on the costs of disasters.

This review analyses the monitoring and evaluation system of Colombia's Online Government Strategy and provides recommendations for developing an impact assessment methodology for digital government. It looks at the background, evolution and current status of the Strategy, and draws insights from the first implementation of a transitional methodology. The findings will help Colombia build the tools and capacities needed to effectively and sustainably implement its digital government strategy.

How can the environmental effects of trade liberalisation agreements be assessed ? Are available methodologies sufficiently tuned to current concerns? In order to take stock of the state of the art in assessment methodologies, the OECD organised a two-day technical workshop to focus on past practice and new tools for assessing the environmental effects of trade agreements. Some two dozen experts from governments, international organisations, universities international organisations, universities and NGOs active in this area presented lessons from past practice and results of the considerable advances made in recent years. This volume brings together the papers presented during the two-day workshop by the invited experts and the comments from a range of governmental and international organisation practitioners and representatives of civil society who participated in the workshop. In addition to the presentations on methodologies, this book includes the workshop rapporteur's summary of the gaps in the existing research in this field.

Despite the fact that education systems have been heavily investing in technology since the early 1980s, international indicators on technology uptake and use in education are missing. This book aims to provide a basis for the design of frameworks, the identification of indicators and existing data sources, as well as gaps in areas needing further research. The contributions stem from an international expert meeting in April 2009 organised by the Centre for Research on Lifelong Learning, in co-operation with OECD (CERI), on benchmarking technology use and effects in education. The contributions clearly demonstrate the need to develop a consensus around approaches, indicators and methodologies. The book is organised around four blocks: contexts of ICT impact assessment in education, state-of-the-art ICT impact assessment, conceptual frameworks and case studies.

Over the past decades, governments have gradually adopted more rigorous environmental policies to tackle challenges associated with pressing environmental issues, such as climate change. The ambition of these policies is, however, often tempered by their perceived negative effects on the economy. The empirical evidence in this volume – covering a decade of OECD analysis – shows that environmental policies have had relatively small effects on economic outcomes such as employment, investment, trade and productivity. At the same time, they have been effective at reducing emissions from industry. The policies can however generate winners and losers across firms, industries and regions: while the least productive firms from high-polluting sectors are adversely affected, more productive firms and low-pollution sectors benefit. Environmental policies can be designed and combined with other policies to compensate workers and industries that may lose and to emphasise their positive impacts.

Policies aimed at reducing the environmental impact of human activities have important consequences for labour markets, jobs, and skills. As employment is shifting towards more sustainable activities, workers are increasingly expected to have skills that support the transition to a greener economy. Assessing and anticipating emerging skill needs is crucial to avoid bottlenecks and sustain the green transition. This report sheds light on existing methods to measure changes in skill demand and supply related to the green transition through an in-depth review of practices in five OECD countries (Australia, Austria, France, Norway and Sweden). It also identifies best practice on how to feed information on changing skill needs into policies, notably in the areas of employment, career guidance, education and adult learning.

Illicit financial flows (IFFs) such as tax evasion are a major policy challenge for developing and emerging economies, in particular as the COVID-19 pandemic has drained domestic resources. This report presents results from a joint project between the OECD and the National Treasury of South Africa, which assesses tax compliance and IFFs in South Africa. The report provides an overview of macroeconomic, tax and fiscal developments in South Africa since the global financial crisis. It discusses the concepts of IFFs, how they relate to the South African context and provides an overview of South Africa’s participation in multilateral initiatives to combat tax evasion. It also provides a quantitative analysis of tax compliance and IFFs over time amid a variety of tax transparency initiatives implemented in South Africa. Finally, the report examines the effectiveness of tax transparency initiatives such as voluntary disclosure programmes, and looks into income and wealth characteristics of applicants to these programmes.

Assessing Scientific, Reading and Mathematical Literacy: A Framework for PISA 2006 presents the conceptual framework underlying the PISA 2006 survey. It includes a re-developed and expanded framework for scientific literacy, an innovative component on the assessment of students’ attitudes to science and the frameworks for the assessment of reading and mathematics. Within each domain, the framework defines the content that students need to acquire, the processes that need to be performed, and the contexts in which knowledge and skills are applied. The domains and their aspects are also illustrated with sample tasks.

This report outlines good practice for regulatory impact assessment (RIA) in transport. It describes the rationale and the benefits of RIA frameworks and offers guidance for the practical implemention of RIA in the transport sector. The report also contains recommendations for governments seeking to implement RIA within their jurisdictions.

Contaminated drinking water contributes to disease in developing and developed countries worldwide.  This book, which is the outcome of a shared WHO-OECD initiative since 1998, provides a state-of-the-art review on approaches and methods used in assessing the microbial safety of drinking-water.  It supports a framework for water and offers guidance on the selection and use of available indicators alongside operational monitoring to meet specific information needs. It looks at potential applications of new technologies and emerging methods.