Browse by: "2009"
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The German Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Affairs has set up a vision which shall improve the situation of the transport system user (in Germany). In order to make use of all resources an intensive co-ordination with the Ministry of Economics and Technology (transport research programme) was undertaken. Originally the project was called Meta-Data-Platform. In course of time the vision of a benefit for an oriented and informed transport system user developed. The Meta-Data-Platform shall enable data exchange of various sources, shall provide common interfaces and protocols, shall allow for exchange of geographical data of different formats and enable business processes between service and content provider organizations. Traffic data shall become more reliable, be of higher quality and access to real time data shall be possible. State authorities for controlling traffic, broadcasting stations for traffic warning news, service providers for individual route recommendations and content owners can make use of the system. The services of the meta data platform can be used as a virtual internet portal. Centralized services for judgment of data quality transfer of different interfaces and protocols and transfer of different geographical formats will be offered separately. Despite having intermodal transport in mind, there will be separate platforms for road and public transport. The realization has been splitted into a bunch of individual projects. Some of the projects have just been started. For some of them call for tenders are presently prepared. Development will take approximately four years. At the end of the development there will be test fields used for validation. Validation will be done with model services.
This paper assembles some evidence on developments in investment by incumbent and alternative telecommunications operators during the period 2000-2005. The quality of data on investment is not in general sufficient to clearly differentiate between investment by new entrants and investment by incumbents. Definitional problems also exist in that the players in communication markets are no longer the traditional alternative operators providing voice services, but a range of service providers including Internet Service Providers and cable television service providers who, through cable modems, provide VoIP services and broadband access. As such it is much harder to make judgements about how policy impacts on investment. Although the period 2000-2005 coincides with the development of broadband in most OECD countries and the implementation of LLU, the paper does not try to show a correlation between investment and unbundling policies.
This paper uses WITCH, an integrated assessment model with a game-theoretic structure, to explore the prospects for, and the stability of broad coalitions to achieve ambitious climate change mitigation action. Only coalitions including all large emitting regions are found to be technically able to meet a concentration stabilisation target below 550 ppm CO2eq by 2100. Once the free-riding incentives of non-participants are taken into account, only a “grand coalition” including virtually all regions can be successful. This grand coalition is profitable as a whole, implying that all countries can gain from participation provided appropriate transfers are made across them. However, neither the grand coalition nor smaller but still environmentally significant coalitions appear to be stable. This is because the collective welfare surplus from cooperation is not found to be large enough for transfers to offset the free-riding incentives of all countries simultaneously. Some factors omitted from the analysis, which might improve coalition stability, include the co-benefits from mitigation action, the costless removal of fossil fuel subsidies, as well as alternative assumptions regarding countries’ bargaining behaviour.
The ICT industry had a tough start to 2009, with almost all first quarter indicators declining, often very sharply. There are signs of recovery, with the rate of decline bottoming out and turning up in the most recent cyclical data (May/June 2009), with positive month-on-month growth for most countries, and inventories running down sharply. Performance in the first quarter of 2009 tested 2001-2002 declines in most ICT sectors, but relative year-on-year declines were not a great deal worse than in 2001-2002 and some sectors have performed better than in the earlier period. The ICT industry is also performing considerably better in this crisis than industries such as automobiles...
This paper studies drivers of high-frequency (daily) dynamics of the South African rand vis-à-vis the dollar from January 2001 to July 2007. We find strong nonlinear effects of commodity prices, perceived country and emerging market risk premium and changes in the dollar-euro exchange rate on changes in daily returns of the rand-dollar exchange rate. We also identify a one-sided nonlinear mean reversion to the long-term monetary equilibrium. In addition we establish very short-lived effects on the exchange rate of selected macroeconomic surprises and central bank communication aimed at talking up the rand.
This paper describes the progress that has been made since 2006 in establishing statistical databases on tax autonomy and intergovernmental grants, aiming to better understand sub-central finance and intergovernmental fiscal relations. The paper is divided into two parts: a first part on taxing power of sub-central governments, and a second part on intergovernmental grants. Some of the work presented here is an update of earlier activities carried out in 1999 and again in 2005. By now the Fiscal Network has time series for both tax autonomy and intergovernmental grants indicators. Most data were obtained through a questionnaire sent to OECD member countries in spring 2008, and data were again revised after the Fiscal Network meeting in December 2008.
This study wants to spot and analyse the “final financial instruments” in which French households’ financial savings are invested by making transparent their intermediated investments with mutual funds and life insurance corporations. It attempts to identify where French households’ savings is finally allocated (France or abroad), who bears the liquidity risk and the market risk. Doing so, the role of financial intermediaries such as insurance corporations and mutual funds may be specified more accurately.
The government’s health reform programme since 2000 has covered many aspects of the organisation of health care and was accompanied by a sizeable increase in spending on healthcare. Many of these reforms have the potential to improve the efficiency and responsiveness of the health care system and ultimately health outcomes, although it is too early to make definitive judgements on their effectiveness. This chapter provides an overview of the organisation and financing of the National Health Service, reviews its performance, assesses the reforms since the start of the decade and provides recommendations for further development. This Working Paper relates to the 2009 Economic Survey of the United Kingdom (www.oecd.org/eco/surveys/uk).
This case study analyses the effect that the end of the Multi-Fibre Agreement (MFA) has had on innovation in the Sri Lankan textile and clothing sector. The ending of the quota system under the MFA led to an increase in the US and EU markets which has motivated a large number of innovations in the Sri Lankan textile and clothing sector. Some large companies have become a total services provider, while others are trying to establish their own brands. Product innovations with foreign partners, process innovations such as introduction of CAD/CAM, and various marketing and organisational innovations have been implemented. Keywords: innovation, textiles and clothing, garment, Sri Lanka, Multi-Fibre Agreement, MFA, competition , CSR, Corporate Social Responsibility, marketing, brands, fair-trade, outsourcing, FDI, joint-ventures
Facilitating the mobilisation, sharing, or exchange of patents is increasingly important to promote innovation in this globalised and well-networked world, where the circulation of ideas and technologies is essential to innovation. In the context of open innovation, patents are expected to play a role as a means for transferring ideas and technologies from one entity to another, in addition to acting as a means for excluding others from using companies’ own ideas and technologies. In such a situation, a variety of new entities focusing on patent-related transactions are emerging. Some IP specialist firms seek to monetise patents by creating strategic patent portfolios and licensing them. Others provide websites to establish online marketplaces where patents and ideas could be traded. And still others establish a co-operative venture that buys and licenses patents to its members for defensive purpose. They also include IP investment banks that will lend against the value of IP, and firms that seek to create funds, similar to mutual funds, which allow investors to earn revenue from royalties. These new players now could significantly influence the circulation of patents. It would be important for governments to deepen their understanding of how these new players are performing in the patent transaction markets in order to support their development in the most socially beneficial directions. This may also be important for traditional technology-oriented companies, since the effective use of patent transaction markets will help them improve their innovation process and strengthen their competitiveness. Therefore, analysis of the functions, business models, and activities of IP specialist firms is the central topic of this research.
The composition of the working-age population can influence aggregate employment and average productivity because both employment rates and productivity levels vary across population groups. This paper assesses the quantitative importance of the working-age population broken down by age, gender and education in explaining differences in employment and productivity levels across countries. Differences in population structure are found to contribute importantly to variations in both labour utilisation and productivity performances. Combining these effects in a mechanical way, differences in the composition of the working-age population account for around a third of the gap in GDP per capita for Europe (EU15) vis-à-vis the United States, mainly due to differences in educational attainment.
This paper uses a large dataset combining census, household survey and budgetary data for nearly 4.000 Brazilian municipalities to estimate the impact of government spending on education and health outcomes. We deal with the multi-dimensional nature of the population’s social status by estimating structural equation models with latent variables using a limited-information two-stage least square (2SLS) estimator. Robustness of the baseline regressions to heterogeneity in the data is assessed on the basis of quantile regressions. The main empirical findings are that government spending is a powerful determinant of education outcomes, but this is not the case for health, and that spending on non-education programmes are also at least as important. In addition, there appears to be scope for gains in economies of scale in the provision of education and health care services, at least for selected segments of the conditional distribution of social outcomes. Finally, there are cross-sectoral effects in service delivery: health (education) outcomes affect the population’s education (health) status. This Working Paper relates to the 2009 OECD Economic Survey of Brazil (www.oecd.org/eco/surveys/brazil).
The aim of this paper is to assess the impact of financial crises on potential output. For this purpose a univariate autoregressive growth equation is estimated on an unbalanced panel of OECD countries over the period 1960 to 2007. Our results suggest that the occurrence of a financial crisis negatively and permanently affects potential output. In particular, financial crises are estimated to lower potential output by around 1.5 to 2.4% on average. The magnitude of the effect increases with the severity of the crisis. The occurrence of a deep crisis is found to decrease potential output by nearly 4%, almost twice the amount observed for the average of crises. These results are robust to the use of an alternative measure of potential output, changes in the methodology and in the sample periods.
This paper examines the cost of a range of national, regional and global mitigation policies and the corresponding incentives for countries to participate in ambitious international mitigation actions. The paper illustrates the scope for available instruments to strengthen these incentives and discusses ways to overcome barriers to the development of an international carbon price, based on the quantitative assessment from two global and sectorially-disaggregated CGE models. Key step towards the emergence of a single international carbon price will most likely involve the phasing out of subsidies of fossil fuel consumption and various forms of linking between regional carbon markets, ranging from direct linking of existing emission trading systems to more indirect forms through the use of sectoral crediting mechanisms. The paper discusses regulatory issues raised by the expansion of emission trading and crediting schemes as well as the complementary contribution of non-market based instruments such as the imposition of technical standards and R&D policies. Finally, the paper emphasises the important role of international transfers, not least to overcome the relatively strong economic incentives in some countries to free ride on other regions mitigation actions. While they can take various explicit or implicit forms, transfers made primarily through market mechanisms, for instance via the allocation of binding emission reduction commitments across countries, would be most cost-effective.
There has been a growing interest in the environmental impact of aviation, both in terms of noise and aircraft engine emissions. Discussions have included both mitigation measures and methods of internalisation of these environmental costs also described as the principle of polluter pays. This paper focuses on CO2 emissions from aircraft engines, which have both local and climate change implications, and where the emphasis of most recent discussions has centred. These have taken place at an international, regional and local level.
This article analyses the innovation agenda of the European Union (EU), places it in the context of globalisation and explores its foundation in the theoretical innovation systems perspective. It analyses a number of the central policy domains of this agenda: higher education, doctoral education, research and knowledge transfer.
In the second part of the article, some major challenges of the EU innovation agenda for European higher education and research are discussed. These challenges concern: future shortages of higher education graduates, the issue of access and equity, limited world-class research excellence, the need to further increase knowledge transfer efforts, the lack of private funding in higher education and research, and the processes of academic stratification and regional differentiation.
Programme-cadre de l’UE en matière d’innovation : les défis de l’enseignement supérieur et de la recherche en Europe
Cet article propose une analyse du programme-cadre de l’UE (Union européenne) pour l’innovation, qu’il place dans le contexte de la mondialisation et dont il explore les fondements à la lumière des systèmes d’innovation théoriques. Il examine différents domaines politiques fondamentaux constituant ce programme-cadre : l’enseignement supérieur, les thèses de doctorat, la recherche et le transfert des connaissances.
Dans une seconde partie, l’article propose une réflexion sur plusieurs défis importants qui attendent ce programme-cadre sur l’innovation pour l’enseignement supérieur et la recherche en Europe : la pénurie future de diplômés de l’enseignement supérieur, la question de l’accès et de l’équité, le niveau d’excellence limité de la recherche à l’échelle mondiale, la nécessité d’accroître les efforts liés au transfert des naissances, le manque de financement privé dans l’enseignement supérieur et la recherche, et les processus de stratification académique et de différentiation régionale.
This paper uses household survey (Sakernas) data from the 1996 and 2004 to estimate the determinants of earnings in Indonesia. The Indonesian labour market is segmented, with a majority of workers engaged in informal-sector occupations, and earnings data are available only for formal-sector workers (salaried employees). This posed problems for the estimation of earnings equations, because selection into different labour market statuses is likely to be non-random. In order to describe selection into different labour market statuses we use the most general version of the method proposed by Dubin and McFadden (1984), which Bourguignon, Fournier and Gurgand (2007) proved to be preferable to other available multinomial selection methods. We also deal with reverse causality between education attainment and earnings by estimating the selection equations using an instrumental variable technique. Our findings cast doubt on the use of a binomial selection rule and suggest that workers with higher levels of educational attainment are most likely to find a job in the formal sector, and that the informal sector is perceived by those workers who cannot obtain a job in the formal sector as an alternative to inactivity. This Working Paper relates to the 2008 OECD Economic Assessment of Indonesia (www.oecd.org/eco/surveys/indonesia).
Asse II, a salt mine in the salt formation of the Upper Permian near Wolfenbüttel, has been the subject of heated debates on environmental policy and law in the Federal Republic of Germany for some time. Until 1995, Asse II was used as a trial facility for the development of techniques for the final disposal of low and intermediate level radioactive waste. Potash and salt rock were produced in this facility from 1909 and 1964 and, after termination
At the turn of the new millennium, therefore, the initial work on SEA (Strategic Environmental Assessment) and transport are eliciting work to evaluate the interest, specifics and feasibility of applying this new tool when formulating transport policy; and a positive appreciation is consolidating of its use and relevance as a tool to support decision-making in this sector. This initial positive assessment is responsible for increasing use of SEA in the design of transport plans and programmes, and a wide ranging analytical toolkit has been developed to adapt to the specifics of the relation between transport planning and the environment — in terms of its main environmental effects, the scales of planning work, the diversity of planning models and the typology of strategic transport decisions. Rather than considering the singularity or specific nature of SEA as applied to decision-making on transport policy, subsequent developments have sought to facilitate and promote the use of this tool by disseminating specific cases or producing guides. This relatively strong development of SEA in the transport sector does not, however, mean that it is free from controversy and ambiguities, because, as shown in the literature (Dalal-Clayton and Sadler, 2005) and by the international SEA community (Wallington et al, 2007, 2008), there is still an ongoing debate on key aspects of SEA, including the definition of its basic objectives.
Since the beginning of the decade, France has seen a marked decline in its export performance, leading to growing concerns on the part of the authorities and of civil society about the economy’s capacity to adapt to the intensified globalisation of trade and investment in goods and services. The poor foreign trade performance of recent years is related to a series of factors, rather than to any single cause. It cannot be explained by external determinants alone, such as the exchange rate, the trade inroads of emerging countries with strong export potential or the sharp rise in oil prices in 2007-08. Indeed, it is not so much the loss of market share itself that is of concern (many countries have experienced this), but rather the extent of that loss, which reflects problems in responding to the acceleration in global demand earlier this decade, before the apparition of the current crisis. An analysis of the deterioration in competitiveness points to supply-side factors such as the relative inability of French firms to service foreign markets, and the pursuit of industrial strategies of offshoring the entire production process. Restoring competitiveness will require steps to strengthen the country’s growth potential and to address the main long-term determinants of that potential, such as fostering research and development, promoting innovation, reducing the tax burden, boosting competition and creating favourable conditions for businesses to grow rapidly. The lack of competitiveness is more often a symptom than the cause of one or more underlying economic weaknesses. What is called for, then, is a comprehensive policy response that addresses the sources of the competitiveness problem, rather than targeted interventions designed directly to remedy the growing trade deficit. This Working Paper relates to the 2009 OECD Economic Survey of France (www.oecd.org/eco/surveys/France).