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This working paper assesses national policy and governance mechanisms that can influence green growth in Chinese cities. It applies the OECD conceptual framework for urban green growth to examine the potential challenges and opportunities for increasing economic growth through reducing the environmental impact of urban land use, transport and buildings; through improving water and air quality; and through fostering supply and demand of green products and services. The paper first situates the issue of green growth within the nexus of urbanisation and environmental challenges now facing China. This is followed by a review of environmental and quality of life challenges posed by rapid urbanisation. Opportunities for national policies to influence green growth in four key urban policy sectors are then examined. The paper concludes with an assessment of governance challenges and considers potential changes to facilitate economic growth while reducing the environmental impact of cities.
The objective of this paper is to better understand how the population growth rates of rural regions are affected by their closeness to urban regions and by the economic performance of the latter. By means of a cross-sectional analysis of OECD TL3 regions, it identifies the growth spillover effects from the net effect of distance to non-rural places. Distance-based measures are used to approximate the extent to which urban and rural areas are integrated in relational terms. Results shows that positive growth spillovers exist, suggesting that spread effects overcome backwash effects and thus that rural regions benefit from the growth process taking place in urban and intermediate regions. After having controlled for these growth spillovers, the distance from urban and intermediate regions has a negative effect on the population growth rate of rural regions. Nevertheless, both the strength of this effect and the growth spillovers decay with distance. Results further suggest that proximity to urban areas has higher positive influence than to intermediate areas.
The growth of urban areas resulting from natural increases in population and migration from rural areas is a global phenomenon.
The impacts of climate change are expected to create numerous challenges for cities. This report synthesizes key points raised in a series of discussions among “adaptation leaders” from fourteen cities around the world. Critical issues for urban adaptation that emerged from the discussions include the need for political commitment at multiple levels of government, information and data as a basis for understanding potential risks and vulnerabilities, meaningful and effective stakeholder engagement shaped by local contexts, and sustained financial and staff resources that are sensitive to urban variability. Further, the findings highlight how policy-makers and international organizations working with cities on issues of adaptation and resilience must support and facilitate processes of testing ideas, learning from experiences, and recalibrating as new information is obtained and lessons are learned.
This paper is intended to serve three purposes. First, it presents a slightly abbreviated version of the summary of the book published by Regional Plan Association (RPA) in January 2011 about the serious capacity and delay problems at the three major airports in New York and what might be done about it. Second, the paper provides information on the response by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the owners and operators of the three airports and what has transpired in the two years since the book was published. Third, the paper discusses some relevant emerging issues that will likely further affect the ability to address the growing problem of capacity and delays at these airports.
This paper describes a conceptual framework that can be used to interpret the general policy issues driving the design, construction, maintenance and evaluation of school buildings in Belgium’s Flemish Community. Within the context of this framework, eight policy challenges relating to the provision of school buildings in Flanders are presented, providing lessons for all national or regional authorities with an interest in governance thinking about school construction issues.
As a continuation of the 2013 SIGMA assessments and as part of a longer-term programme of work, SIGMA has identified country priorities for public administration reform (PAR) for Turkey. Priorities cover the overall PAR needs of the country, including areas which were not covered by the assessments. Priorities in areas outside the scope of SIGMA assessments are based on other analytical sources and SIGMA’s practical experience of working with the country. SIGMA proposes priority 2020 targets for the countries, sub-targets when needed, and sequenced priority activities in 1-2, 3-5 and 5+ year time perspectives.
Each year SIGMA produces assessment reports as a contribution to the EC’s annual reports on EU candidate countries and potential candidates, as well as to its programming of technical assistance. These reports assess progress made in public administration reform by our beneficiary countries. The report for Turkey analyses and takes stock of progress achieved by this country in 2013, with an aim to also provide inputs into its reform agenda. It focuses on external audit.
As one of the world’s largest emerging economies, Indonesia has experienced rapid economic growth and substantial reduction of poverty over the past three decades, particularly prior to the 1997-98 Asian Financial Crisis. After the crisis, Indonesia entered a new development phase that saw the fall of the Suharto government and new governance which moved highly centralised policies and powers towards a decentralised process. This research report analyses economic and social patterns and trends of poverty and inequality in Indonesia with a particular focus on the decentralisation period from 2001 to 2010.The Indonesian political and economic environment has changed significantly during this period and this had implications for individual wellbeing, regional economic prosperity and national economic growth. The report finds that in general, absolute poverty rates have continued to decline during the decentralisation period although the reduction has not been as strong as it was prior to the Asian economic crisis. In contrast, consumption inequality has increased during the same period. New estimates of growth and inequality elasticity of poverty suggest that this rising inequality has been offsetting the positive benefits of consumption growth on poverty.
Young people have been hit hard by unemployment during the Irish recession. While much research has been undertaken to study the effects of the recession on overall labour market dynamics, little is known about the specific effects on youth unemployment and the associated challenges. This paper attempts to fill this gap by comparing the profile of transitions to work before the recession (2006) and as the economy emerged from the recession (2011). The results indicate that the rate of transition of the youth from unemployment to employment fell dramatically. The fall is not due to changes in the composition or the characteristics of the unemployed group but to changes in the external environment, which implied that the impact of certain individual characteristics changed over the course of the recession. In particular, for youth, education and nationality have become more important for finding a job in Ireland.
While it is widely accepted that there are adjustment costs associated with the reallocation of resources in response to freer trade, in most models these costs are assumed to be very small. However, more recent evidence is casting doubt on this assumption. This paper develops a unique dataset based on harmonised labour force surveys for six economies, facilitating the comparison of short term labour market impacts from trade across countries. Data are reported at the individual worker level, allowing a comparison of impacts at both the industry and occupation levels. While the results of this empirical analysis at the industry level are very much in line with established research, the results at the occupation level are more varied. Overall, and as expected, impacts are generally larger for occupations than at the industry level. These results are consistent with modern trade theory which posits that an expanding export sector rewards mostly high skilled workers and that some workers may find it more difficult to switch occupations than to switch industries. Outcomes can also be explained in the context of labour market frictions and highlight the important role of labour market policy – as well as trade policy – in structural adjustment. Our results are consistent with sticky sector-specific human capital and information asymmetries, especially with respect to opportunities in different regions within the same country. A wide range of policies can be employed to address these labour market frictions to improve worker mobility and reduce adjustment costs. Further efforts to specify appropriate policies to accompany trade openness is warranted; doing so would go a long way towards improving employment outcomes and generating more inclusive growth.
Taking global value chains (GVCs) into account has important implications for trade policy. When production is vertically fragmented and trade in intermediate inputs is prevalent, one has to look differently at a certain number of issues. Through case studies, this paper provides new evidence on the incidence on services of tariffs levied on goods (case study 1) and then discusses effective rates of protection in a world of GVCs and what the removal of tariffs on intermediate inputs implies, using the example of Canada (case study 2). To illustrate how trade agreements could be made more relevant for GVCs, the paper further looks at sectoral approaches in trade negotiations through the example of the Information Technology Agreement (case study 3) and finally compares the network of regional trade agreements in force with global production networks (case study 4).
This report presents the findings of the OECD indicators for assessing the impact of specific trade facilitation measures on developing countries’ trade. Sixteen trade facilitation indicators (TFIs) have been constructed, corresponding to the main policy areas under negotiation at the WTO, with the aim to estimate the impact of addressing specific hurdles in the trade and border procedures of a given country. The policy areas that seem to have the greatest impact on trade volumes and trade costs not only for imports but also to export performance are the availability of trade-related information, the simplification and harmonization of documents, the streamlining of procedures and the use of automated processes. The combined effect of improvements in these areas is greater than the simple sum of the impact of individual measures, reaching almost 14.5% reduction of total trade costs for low income countries, 15.5% for lower middle income countries and 13.2% for upper middle income countries.
Understanding trade costs is essential for formulating policy interventions designed to reduce such costs. This report synthesises all OECD work on cost factors across the entire trade chain. These factors can be located behind the border, such as non-tariff regulatory measures, market access restrictions, trade finance availability and costs and general impediments on doing business; crossing the border, such as documentation and customs compliance requirements, lengthy administrative procedures and other delays; and in all stages of the international trade chain, such as transport infrastructure and logistics. The report proposes a series of questions to help identify priority areas, taking into account country specificities. The strong interdependencies between cost factors, magnified by the prevalence of global value chains, mean that policies to address costs and facilitate trade need to be undertaken in a comprehensive manner, although the cost-benefit ratio of certain trade facilitation reforms, particularly at the border, may offer immediate and significant benefits.
This report examines examples of new and emerging governance models that aim to support the responsible development of diagnostics and treatments based on the latest advances in biomedicine. In particular, it presents programmes and initiatives that aim to manage uncertainty in the development and approval of new medical products and thereby to improve the understanding of the risk/benefit balance. It also identifies some of the main challenges for policy makers, regulators and other communities involved in the translation of biomedical innovation and health technologies from the laboratory bench to point of care.
The environment is a hot topic in the press and classrooms and much has been said about the need for action to protect our planet. Education plays a crucial role in raising awareness of environmental challenges and shaping the attitudes and behaviours that can make a difference.
The growing rate of obesity is one of the most significant health trends in OECD countries and increasingly, in Brazil, Russia, India and China, the “BRIC” countries. Perhaps surprisingly, this health trend is also strongly linked to lower educational attainment – both as a cause and as an effect.
This article examines the scope and size of adjustments made by statisticians on source data from public accounting systems in EU member states to reach harmonised statistical measures. The article focuses on EDP Table 2 which shows the reconciliation from cash/cash modified or accrual public accounting to ESA 95, analyses the potential changes needed to EDP Table 2 if public accounting is on a full accrual/IPSAS basis, and proposes a possible way forward for better reconciling the relevant reporting balances. The analysis takes into account the study carried out by the European Commission report on the “Suitability of International Accounting Standards for the Public Sector (IPSAS) for the EU member states”, and the differences between statistical reporting and IPSAS highlighted by IPSASB in the consultation paper on “IPSASs and Government Finance Statistics”.
The sustainability of national economies will ultimately require a balance between near-term growth and longer-term fiscal consolidation. The question that is now being raised is whether such actions are politically sustainable. As the OECD area begins to emerge from the recession, another question is whether democratic countries can take pro-active leadership before a crisis forces their hand. This article examines the politics of fiscal consolidations in OECD countries in recent years, assessing whether and how leaders attempted to resolve the tensions between the fiscal and electoral imperatives.
JEL classification: H610, H620, H630, H680, P160
Keywords: Fiscal consolidation, sustainability of public finances, deficit, debt, Great Recession, financial crisis, political efficacy, democratic institutions, fiscal austerity, economic growth, role of political institutions, budget cuts, fiscal rules, political outcomes