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Drawing on the OECD’s expertise in comparing country experiences and identifying best practices, the Better Policies series tailors the OECD’s policy advice to the specific and timely priorities of member and partner countries, focusing on how governments can make reform happen.
While access to schooling has expanded around the world, many countries have not realised the hoped-for improvements in economic and social well-being. Access to education by itself is an incomplete goal for development; many students leave the education system without basic proficiency in literacy and numeracy. As the world coalesces around new sustainable development targets towards 2030, the focus in education is shifting towards access and quality. Using projections based on data from the OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) and other international student assessments, this report offers a glimpse of the stunning economic and social benefits that all countries, regardless of their national wealth, stand to gain if they ensure that every child not only has access to education but, through that education, acquires at least the baseline level of skills needed to participate fully in society.
Given the increasing competitiveness and greater geo-political significance of higher education and research, and the under-developed profile of many new Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), this study seeks to examine the processes and strategies being devised by new HEIs to grow research. By focusing on new HEIs, this book provides a unique profile of the experiences of a group of institutions that has hitherto been unidentified and unexplored. It analyses results drawn from an in-depth study of twenty-five HEIs from across sixteen countries: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Hong Kong China, Hungary, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom.
This publication sheds light on the issues now facing today’s universities as they confront the increasing pressure to “produce” research to keep the competitive edge. Drawing on eight case studies, the report focuses on four key themes:
- The growing significance of the research mission to higher education.
- Strengthening structures and processes for research management.
- Funding and resourcing university research.
- Nurturing research careers.
Case studies highlight issues in Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Germany, Ireland, Malaysia, Portugal and Turkey.
Universities are key elements in the science systems in all OECD countries. However, university research in OECD countries is currently the object of considerable tensions in a context of globalisation, reduced budgets and a changing interface with industry. How can universities adapt to this new order? How can the potential of university research best be enhanced?
This study surveys these issues, consolidating the most up-to-date data on resources and structures of research activities in higher education systems and providing illustrative examples of institutional adaptations. It discusses related government measures and formulates policy orientations to enable countries to rise to the challenges of the coming years.
This report discusses challenges and opportunities in assessing the impacts of science-industry knowledge exchange on innovation. The report provides new evidence on joint industry-science patenting activity and academic start-ups, as well as on the impact of geographical proximity between research institutions and industry on local innovation. The report explores the complex set of knowledge-transfer channels, such as collaborative research, co-patenting, academic spinoffs, and their relative importance across science fields and industry sectors. It also experiments with using labour force survey data to assess the contributions of graduates in social sciences to different industries.
Different policy mixes are used in OECD countries to stimulate science-industry knowledge transfer. This report presents a taxonomy of 21 policy instruments, which include grants for collaborative university-industry research and financial support to university spin-offs, and discusses their possible positive and negative interactions. Based on a number of country case studies, the report also sheds light on new policy approaches to support spin-off creation. The report also explores recent trends on the governance of public research of high relevance to science-industry knowledge transfer using newly developed policy indicators for 35 OECD countries.
The Brussels-Capital Region has witnessed significant improvements in its labour market over the past decade. Local job creation has been driven by ample opportunities for highly-skilled workers whom the Brussels-Capital Region attracts from its surrounding regions, the European Union, and beyond. However, not all of the region’s population has seen their labour market prospects improve equally. Many workers with lower levels of education continue to compete for a small number of vacancies, despite the increasingly tightening labour market.
A future vision for the Brussels-Capital Region, therefore, needs to be built on recognising and addressing the multiple and often distinct challenges faced by its young and diverse population. In a labour market that offers high rewards for skills formation, tailoring continuous education and training offerings to different groups while removing barriers to participation in such programmes will need to take priority. Simplifying processes for accessing employment services, streamlining labour market policies, supporting the geographic mobility of less-educated jobseekers, and removing barriers to employment for its migrant population could serve as building blocks to increase labour force participation and improve the employment quality of all local talent.
Today, with the completion of First-of-a-Kind Gen-III nuclear reactors, the nuclear sector is at a critical juncture. These reactors have led in several parts of the world to delays and construction costs overruns that have challenged the competitiveness of nuclear power and are driving the risk perception of future projects. Against this background, a review of historical and recent lessons learnt from nuclear and non-nuclear project offers ample evidence that nuclear new build can be delivered cost and time-effectively.
This study assesses the policy and governance frameworks needed to drive positive learning and continuous industrial performance for nuclear new build. The study also explores the risk allocation and mitigation priorities needed to define adequate financing schemes for these projects. In the longer-term, it identifies cost reduction opportunities associated with the harmonisation of code and standards and licensing regimes and new innovative designs (i.e. small modular reactors and advanced reactors).
In the midst of a global slowdown in productivity, unlocking the innovative potential of rural places is more important than ever. As part of a series on supporting to help rural areas thrive, this thematic report provides the latest analysis and research on rural innovation, and proposes ways to overcome the growing gaps between rural and urban places that are contributing to the geographies of discontent. It first explores the multi-facetted innovative practices that are already occurring in rural places, and proposes alternative indicators beyond the traditional science and technology measures to capture them. Then, it identifies policy drivers and bottlenecks to help rural entrepreneurs, firms and people fully mobilise their growth potential. Results and recommendations are drawn from research and fact-finding missions from select OECD member countries.
The clean energy transition requires a fundamental transformation of power systems, including much higher levels of digitalisation at scale across all grid domains, from generation to transmission and distribution to end-use. Strong policy attention is required to scale up investments in smarter and more resilient grids in emerging and developing economies where electricity consumption is set to grow at a rapid rate while also providing greater levels of electricity access. Investments in smarter and more resilient grids will be necessary to accommodate the greater deployment of renewable energy and enhance energy security.
Digital technologies designed for power systems are instrumental to unlock essential system services required to integrate high shares of variable renewable energy. They can also provide solutions to leverage data flows, connectivity, and management across the whole electricity system. To unlock these digital opportunities, adequate planning, investment, and policy action are needed.
As part of the Digital Demand Driven Electricity Networks (3DEN) initiative, this report provides guidance for energy policy makers on possible ways to enable and drive investments in smart and resilient electricity grids. It also gives suggestions on how to start creating an environment that supports the effective use of innovative digital technologies within the electricity sector. It draws on examples and case studies to show the wide range of digital opportunities and solutions that can help governments implement efficient and smart power systems.
This report provides an overview of funding and financing instruments available to support infrastructure investment in cities and regions. Subnational governments have a critical role to deliver, operate and maintain infrastructure, and to invest to help drive the recovery from COVID-19. In recent years, many subnational governments have introduced innovations in the types of instruments used to access funding and financing. Highlighting examples from G20, OECD and non-OECD countries, this report presents a framework to differentiate funding and financing instruments, including by type of instrument, and their use, and outlines essential framework conditions that are needed to support subnational governments, The report was submitted to the G20 Infrastructure Working Group under the Italian Presidency and key findings were presented at the G20 High-level Conference on Local Infrastructure in Genoa, Italy on 27 September 2021.
Distributed energy resources (DERs) are small-scale energy resources usually situated near sites of electricity use, such as rooftop solar panels and battery storage. Their rapid expansion is transforming not only the way electricity is generated, but also how it is traded, delivered and consumed.Accordingly, DERs can create new power system opportunities, but at the same time, can pose new challenges when a grid has not been properly prepared. Many jurisdictions are just beginning to understand how DERs fit into the wider energy landscape – what they are and what impacts they have on the grid, and how they can be used to improve system reliability and reduce overall energy costs. Meanwhile, other regions have built up experience with DERs, demonstrating that they can provide valuable services to the grid when incentivised with appropriate technologies, policies and regulations.Nonetheless, not all countries use the same electricity market model or are at the same stage of DER penetration, and the fit-for-purpose solutions will vary from place to place. This report reviews lessons from forerunners and distils best practices (with examples and case studies) to help policymakers, regulators and system operators across the globe understand what experience is most relevant to their own situation. Readers will be able to draw on a wide range of practical insights for electricity market design and regulation to help unlock the multiple grid benefits of DER technologies.
Among the millions of asylum seekers who recently arrived in OECD countries, the majority are young people who may be able to take advantage of vocational education and training (VET) opportunities to help them enter skilled employment. This report provides advice to governments and other stakeholders who are seeking to use VET to promote integration, in particular for young humanitarian migrants. While the study draws particularly on policy and practice observed in Germany, Italy, Sweden and Switzerland, it also highlights other international practices.
The report focuses on the main channels through which migrants succeed in VET. It is essential that migrants are fully informed about the opportunities VET provision offers and that they have access to high quality preparatory programmes enabling access to upper-secondary VET. Once in such provision, targeted support should help them to complete VET programmes successfully. OECD countries are putting in place innovative measures to achieve better outcomes for both migrants and for economies as a whole. Ultimately this report argues that VET systems can become stronger, more flexible and more inclusive, when working better for all students, including those with diverse and vulnerable backgrounds.
The German vocational education and training (VET) system is admired around the world for its ability to prepare young people for skilled employment. In Germany, VET smooths transitions into work and is closely aligned with labour market demand. This report focuses on an unprecedented test of the German VET system: how to respond to the significant increase in migrants who arrived in the country in 2015-16. The study explores both the opportunities and the challenges presented by migration. Germany has already devoted significant attention to VET as a mechanism for enabling integration – and for good reason. Work-based learning assists integration because it demonstrably gives learners skills that employers want in real-world settings. The report assesses the barriers faced by learners in their journeys into and through VET, exploring how such challenges can be addressed. In addition, the study looks at system-wide issues in relation to how VET provision and integration policy is governed. Lastly, it explores opportunities for increased flexibility in the German VET system of relevance to all youth at risk of not succeeding in VET. In responding to migrant needs, German VET can become more inclusive without reducing quality.
Demographic pressure and the youth bulge in the developing world pose a major employment challenge. This situation is exacerbated by insufficient job creation, scarce formal wage employment opportunities and vulnerability in the workplace. For these reasons, fostering youth entrepreneurship has gained importance in the global and national development policy agenda. This report aims to contribute to the ongoing debate on the role of youth entrepreneurship in generating employment in developing countries. It is based on the analysis of mixed labour force and enterprise surveys conducted in Côte d’Ivoire, Madagascar, Peru and Viet Nam, as well as evidence on the impact of entrepreneurship programmes. This report’s findings add to the global debate on youth entrepreneurship in three important ways. First, it constitutes an unprecedented effort to capture the real situations and multiple faces of young entrepreneurs in selected developing countries. Second, it provides new empirical evidence on the determinants of youth entrepreneurial performance. Third, it proposes a policy roadmap based on lessons learned from recent meta-analyses of the effectiveness of entrepreneurship programmes.
Subnational governments carry out more than 60% of total public procurement in OECD countries. As such, public procurement can offer a powerful tool for cities to boost local growth and advance their strategic priorities, ranging from innovation and inclusion to the transition to a low-carbon economy. Bratislava, the most populated and richest municipality in the Slovak Republic, carried out 39% of its expenditures through public procurement in 2019. The COVID-19 crisis has enhanced both the urgency and the opportunity to improve the city's procurement system and to rethink "what" and "how" to procure. In this context, Bratislava is developing new directives to make its procurement processes more efficient. This report offers recommendations on how Bratislava can use public procurement strategically to identify value-for-money solutions, foster competition, and promote sustainable urban development. The report also includes a concrete case study on Bratislava’s public procurement for street lighting, which provides methodological guidance on the analysis of needs, market engagement, and tender design.
As digital transformation has accelerated, the e-commerce landscape has become increasingly dynamic. New players have emerged at the same time that established actors have taken on new roles; some barriers to e-commerce at the firm, individual and country levels have been overcome, while other barriers have emerged. Innovative business models have transformed buyer-seller relationships and pushed out the frontier of what is possible to buy and sell online. This report analyses new and emerging e-commerce business models, examines e-commerce trends along a range of dimensions, and offers new insights on the policies needed to exploit the opportunities and mitigate the challenges of unlocking the potential of e-commerce for all.
This report reviews recent trends in international migration, describing the size of current foreign-born populations across countries and analysing factors associated to the size and nature of these populations, reviews a set of important differences and similarities across educational systems and gives a brief description of population sizes across countries.
It also provides an overview of the evidence emerging from PISA 2009 on the performance and socio-economic background of children of immigrants. Who are the children of immigrants? What do they know and what can they do? How do they differ from other students? Do they approach school and learning in a different way? It examines more closely the issue of assessment language proficiency among immigrant students and its possible impact on cognitive outcomes in PISA. It explores the effect of age at arrival on the performance of immigrant students in the PISA tests of literacy.
Selective migration policies of certain countries and the attractiveness of these countries generally to highly educated migrants is also explored.
It also discusses the future educational and professional career of the children of immigrant related to their performance in PISA. Does the skill and knowledge disadvantage at age 15 translate into a disadvantage in later educational outcomes? For example, are those children of immigrants less likely to access a post-secondary educational institution?
Chinese NOCs first ventured overseas to invest in oil and gas production more than 20 years ago. Today, they have emerged to become international players with activities spreading across more than 40 countries and producing 2.5 million barrels of oil equivalent per day (mboe/d) of oil and gas outside of China. Chinese companies have contributed much-needed investments in global oil and gas production.
This report provides an update on overseas activity by China’s National Oil Companies (NOCs) between 2011 and 2013 and is a follow-up publication of IEA’s previous report in 2011, Overseas Investments by Chinese National Oil Companies: Assessing the Drivers and Impacts. It aims to examine the trends exhibited by investments made by Chinese NOCs and the risks and challenges they face today and raised the question if China’s long standing non-interference foreign policy could still be valid given China’s worldwide commercial interests, including those of the NOCs’.
This joint publication of the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Statistical Office of the European Communities (Eurostat) and the World Bank complements the recommendations of the System of National Accounts, 1993 (1993 SNA), and reflects changes and improvements that have been introduced to the system of national accounts since its last revision in 1993.
Along with the 1993 SNA, Updates and Amendments supports the implementation of international standards of national accounting and provides the methodological basis for improving the international comparability of national accounts data. The publication contains the text of the 1993 SNA that has been updated as a result of the adoption of new international standards for the statistical measurement of financial derivatives. It also includes four functional classifications that were fully elaborated and updated after the 1993 SNA was published. It also provides for the first time a glossary of terms and definitions.
Languages: [Arabic]; [Chinese]; [English]; [Russian]; [Spanish]