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The impact of information technology, innovation and entrepreneurship on economic performance is the subject of heated debate. Despite the current economic downturn, changes in these factors have brought about crucial, lasting changes to the growth dynamics of OECD countries.

This special edition of the Science, Technology and Industry Outlook takes a closer look at the ways in which these factors are evolving and how they relate to each other. It examines the main problem areas and recommends a number of policy responses. The areas which receive in-depth consideration include policies to increase returns from ICT investment, software, telecom reform, raising returns from R&D, industry science relations, and policies to facilitate the entry of new firms as well as the exit of existing uncompetitive ones. A key message is that an improved performance requires coherent and comprehensive policy responses. While domestic policy must take the lead in many areas, some of the obstacles to communication, scientific development, innovation and entrepreneurship cannot be removed through national measures alone. The report highlights a number of issues which require international solutions that can only be implemented through improved international co-operation.

As the world interconnects, science, technology and innovation policies cannot be seen as standing alone. There is a growing interest from central banks and ministries of finance in improving the understanding of how science, technology and innovation create value in the form of increased productivity and profits, and contribute to the valuation of enterprises, and ultimately stimulate the growth and competitiveness of economies. This conference proceedings of the OECD Blue Sky II Forum describes some of the policy needs, measurement issues, and challenges in describing cross-cutting and emerging topics in science, technology and innovation (STI). It also presents ideas to exploit existing data and develop new frameworks of measurement in order to guide future development of STI indicators at the OECD and beyond.

This book offers a comprehensive assessment of the innovation system of Viet Nam, focusing on the role of government and providing concrete recommendations on how to improve policies that affect innovation and R&D performance.

This report looks at how scientific advice can best support crisis management during transnational crises, such as those provoked by natural hazards or pandemics. Scientific advice has an important role to play in all phases of the crisis management cycle - preparedness, response and recovery.  It can be particularly valuable during the sense-making period when a crisis occurs and develops.  However, this value is dependent on the quality and timeliness of the advice and most importantly its relevance to the decisions that crisis managers and policy-makers have to make during a crisis. Generating rigorous scientific advice requires access to relevant data, information and expertise, across scientific disciplines and across borders. Ensuring this advice is useful requires effective connections between scientific advisory processes and crisis management mechanisms, including at the international level.

This Round Table presents a series of Case Studies on 14 European cities on the scope for railway transport in urban areas.

This Round Table asks whether trams and trolley buses have any future.

The price regulation conducted by economic regulators is a high-stakes process, with significant and lasting impacts on current and future service quality and the overall performance of the regulated sector. This report tracks the efforts of the economic regulator of the Scottish water sector to make the results of its price-setting process work better for the customers of today and tomorrow, addressing issues such as customer engagement, sustainable asset management and climate change. Based on the results of a multi-year peer review, it analyses the process and outputs of the price setting process. It also sets out recommendations to help parties strengthen the resilience and stability of the regulatory framework while not losing sight of strategic vision and objectives.

Students in Scotland (United Kingdom) engage in learning through Curriculum for Excellence (CfE), which aims to provide them with a holistic, coherent, and future-oriented approach to learning between the ages of 3 and 18. CfE offers an inspiring and widely supported philosophy of education. Schools design their own curriculum based on a common framework which allows for effective curricular practices. In 2020, Scotland invited the OECD to assess the implementation of CfE in primary and secondary schools to understand how school curricula have been designed and implemented in recent years. This report analyses the progress made with CfE since 2015, building upon several months of observations in Scotland, the existing literature and experiences from other OECD countries. The OECD analysis and recommendations aim to support Scotland as it further enhances CfE to achieve its potential for the present and future of its learners. Just as Scotland’s Curriculum for Excellence was among the pioneers of 21st century learning, its most recent developments hold valuable lessons for other education systems and their own curriculum policies.

This document suggests an Integrated Approach on Testing and Assessment (IATA) for serious eye damage and eye irritation hazard identification. The document also provides key information characteristics of each of the individual information sources comprising the IATA. Furthermore it provides guidance on how and when to integrate existing and/or newly generated information for decision making, including decisions on the need for further testing or final decisions on classification and labelling regarding the potential eye hazard effects of test chemicals.

This document is the second edition of the Performance Standards (PS) for the assessment of proposed similar or modified methods to the Direct Peptide Reactivity Assay (DPRA) and the Amino acid Derivative Reactivity Assay (ADRA), both included in TG 442C for in chemico skin sensitisation assays addressing the Adverse Outcome Pathway Key Event on covalent binding to proteins. They are intended for the developers of new or modified similar test methods.

This review highlights achievements of the Mexican Institute of Social Security (Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social, IMSS) in a number of areas – human resources, technological capacities and relations with suppliers – which were previously identified by the OECD as pivotal for the successful reform of IMSS procurement operations. This report highlights the progress made and offers recommendations to support IMSS in achieving procurement excellence and fulfilling its mandate to provide the best possible, most cost-effective healthcare services to citizens.

This report presenst a general review of the working of the European Conference of Ministers of Transport and its relations with other international organisations.  As well as detailing the sectoral studies undertaken by the Conference the report contains a general review of the transport situation in the ECMT area during the year 1955.

A Quality Assurance (QA) Programme is a cornerstone in the OECD Principles on Good Laboratory Practice (GLP) within a test facility. QA constitutes an internal mechanism of continuous monitoring for assuring test facility management (TFM) of the GLP compliance of the test facility and of the studies conducted therein. This document clarifies the requirements as stated in the GLP Principles and integrates a risk-based approach to manage GLP QA programmes It has also incorporates all QA aspects from past documents, updating and replacing Document No. 4.

This volume is the fourteenth of the series “Chemical Thermodynamics” published by the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency. It is the second update of the critical reviews published, successively, in 1992 as Chemical Thermodynamics of Uranium, in 1995 as Chemical Thermodynamics of Americium, in 1999 as Chemical Thermodynamics of Technetium, in 2001 as Chemical Thermodynamics of Neptunium and Plutonium and in 2003 as the first Update on the Chemical Thermodynamics of Uranium, Neptunium, Plutonium, Americium and Technetium. A team, composed of nine internationally recognised experts, has critically reviewed all the relevant scientific literature for the above mentioned systems that has appeared since the publication of the earlier volumes. The results of this assessment, carried out following the Guidelines of the Thermochemical Database Project, have been documented in the present volume, which contains new tables of selected values for formation and reaction data and an extensive bibliography. The database system developed at the NEA Data Bank ensures consistency within the recommended data sets. This volume will be of particular interest to scientists carrying out performance assessments of deep geological disposal sites for radioactive waste.

In this report, released in May at the annual meeting of the OECD Council at ministerial level, the Secretary-General summarises the activities of the OECD during the previous year.

In this report, released in May at the annual meeting of the OECD Council at ministerial level, the Secretary-General summarises the activities of the OECD during the previous year.

In this report, released in May at the annual meeting of the OECD Council at ministerial level, the Secretary-General summarises the activities of the OECD during the previous year.

The OECD Secretary-General's annual report to ministers covers not only the activities of the SG and his office, horizontal programs and activities of the directorates but also the activities of its agencies and special entities.

The OECD Secretary-General's annual report to ministers covers not only the activities of the SG and his office, horizontal programs and activities of the directorates but also the activities of its agencies and special entities.