Focus on green recovery

Transport emissions

What can the transport sector do to deliver on its decarbonisation ambitions?

Green but at what cost?

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Paris and the circular economy

The road to better battery recycling

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What can governments do?

ENSURE GREEN JOBS & GROWTH

BUILD BACK BETTER

ACCELERATE A LOW-CARBON TRANSITION

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07/03/2024
This new web format for Environment at a Glance Indicators provides real-time interactive on-line access to the latest comparable OECD-country data on the environment from the OECD Core Set of Environmental Indicators – a tool to evaluate environmental performance in countries and to track the course towards sustainable development. The web version allows users to play with the data and graphics, download and share them, and consult and download thematic web-books. These indicators provide key messages on major environmental trends in areas such as climate change, biodiversity, water resources, air quality, circular economy and ocean resources. They are accompanied by a short Environment at a Glance report that presents a digest of the key messages stemming from the indicators.
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27/06/2023
Fiscal spending policies adopted in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic have been presented as a unique opportunity to “build back better” and re-ignite the economy while accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy. This paper analyses 1 166 funding measures announced by 51 countries and the European Union in 2020-21 to support development and diffusion of low-carbon technologies. These measures – amounting to USD 1.29 trillion – can make an important contribution to filling the climate investment gap, particularly in emerging technologies such as carbon capture, usage and storage and green hydrogen. A modelling analysis suggests that they could have large impacts on greenhouse gas emissions and bring about significant co-benefits in terms of clean sectors’ output growth and reductions in fossil fuel imports.
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01/03/2023
The automotive sector is important across OECD countries in terms of value-added and R&D, but is also heavily affected by the green and the digital transformations. This paper offers a novel and holistic view of the automotive sector and its surrounding ecosystem based on a combination of Inter-Country Input-Output (ICIO) tables, patent data, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) transactions, cross-country micro-distributed data and firm-level balance sheet data. It identifies the boundaries of this industrial ecosystem including connected sectors (e.g. upstream and downstream) as well as knowledge and technology providers (e.g. universities or the digital industry). The paper documents emerging trends at the geographical and technological levels and provides a comprehensive assessment of the ecosystem’s changing microstructure, with a growing role of young and digital-intensive companies. Finally, it provides recommendations for effective public policies to support the automotive ecosystem, with a focus on innovation, competition and the growth of young firms.
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01/03/2023
The transition to climate neutrality requires cost reductions in existing clean technologies to enable rapid deployment on a large scale, as well as the development of emerging technologies such as green hydrogen. This policy paper argues that science, technology, innovation, and industrial (STI&I) policies focusing on developing and deploying low-carbon technologies are crucial to achieving carbon neutrality. It notes however that the current level of innovation is insufficient to meet the net-zero challenge due to a policy emphasis on deployment rather than research and development (R&D) support. The paper explores the rationale for more ambitious STI&I policies targeted at R&D for climate neutrality and provides policy recommendations for an effective innovation policy for net-zero, including its interaction with the broader climate policy package.
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22/02/2023
The economic consequences for firms investing in green innovation, and therefore their incentives to innovate, are not well understood. This paper empirically assesses the economic returns on innovation in cleaner vehicles. The analysis uses data on passenger car market shares and patents for car manufacturers operating in eight countries for the period 2005-2021. The results show that, when vehicle fuel prices increase, firms having previously successfully filed patents related to both electric and hybrid vehicles and fuel efficiency experience an increase in their market share. This increase takes place between 7 and 8 years after the patent stock is accumulated for patents related to electric and hybrid vehicles and between 8 and 15 years for patents related to fuel efficiency. The analysis also finds that in contexts where fuel price salience is high, price increases generate larger and earlier competitiveness returns for firms having previously invested in cleaner technologies.
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13/12/2022
The OECD Review of Fisheries 2022 brings together and analyses data on fisheries management and support policies to inform decision makers and help foster sustainable and resilient fisheries that can provide jobs, food, and livelihoods for future generations. The Review assesses the health and productivity of fish stocks and explores how they can be better managed. It updates and analyses the OECD Fisheries Support Estimate (FSE), the most comprehensive and detailed collection of country-level data on governments support to fisheries, covering both subsidies and services to the sector in OECD countries and other major fishing nations. These support measures are categorised according to the risks of encouraging unsustainable fishing they can pose in the absence of effective fisheries management. Lastly, the Review suggests policy options to eliminate support to illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing and investigates how to avoid ocean plastic pollution from ghost fishing gear.
22/11/2022
Despite calls for the reform of incentives, including subsidies, harmful to biodiversity, including under the Convention on Biological Diversity and its 2011-2020 Aichi Targets, very few countries to date have undertaken what is considered the first step in this process, namely, to identify and assess the types and magnitudes of any incentives in place at the national level which are harmful for biodiversity or the environment more broadly. This paper begins with a brief literature review on subsidies harmful to biodiversity, followed by a detailed review and comparison of the existing national level studies to identify and assess subsidies and other incentives harmful to biodiversity or the environment. The report concludes with guidance and good practice insights to identify and assess subsidies and other incentives harmful to biodiversity, at national level.
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15/11/2022
OECD Regions and Cities at a Glance presents indicators on individual regions and cities since the turn of the new millennium. It provides a comprehensive picture of past successes and likely challenges that regions and cities in OECD members and partner countries will face in their efforts to build stronger, more sustainable and more resilient economies. By relying on a combination of traditional and more innovative data sources, OECD Regions and Cities at a Glance describes the evolving nature of spatial disparities within countries from a multidimensional perspective. New topics covered by this edition include the economic impact of recent shocks, such as the pandemic and the energy crisis, housing affordability, climate change and digitalisation.
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08/11/2022
Understanding adults’ attitudes towards the environment is necessary to gauge the opportunities and challenges of creating effective and politically-feasible climate policies. Using data from the Wellcome Global Monitor 2020, the European Social Survey (Round 8), World Values Survey and EM-DAT, this paper examines how adults’ environmental attitudes vary within and across countries and details how environmental attitudes are associated with adults’ engagement in pro-environmental behaviours and support for environmentally-friendly policies. The paper explores whether the extent to which individuals prioritise the environment over the state of the economy or vice versa depends on individuals’ exposure to natural disasters or negative labour market conditions. Results indicate that people’s economic vulnerability and the sectors they work in impact their attitudes towards their environment and support for public policy. Furthermore, the findings suggest that increases in unemployment and exposure to natural disasters influence the extent to which individuals prioritise the environment.
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07/11/2022
There are major gaps in the measurement of the adoption and stringency of countries’ climate actions and policies, notably in a manner coherent across countries, time, sectors and instrument types. The climate actions and policies measurement framework (CAPMF) aims to fill this gap. It is a structured and harmonised climate mitigation policy database that informs about countries’ climate action. The CAPMF was developed under the International Programme for Action on Climate (IPAC). It comprises 128 policy variables, grouped into 56 policy instruments and other climate actions, covering the 52 countries participating in IPAC and the period 2000-2020. The CAPMF is the most comprehensive internationally harmonised climate-related policy database currently available. Results indicate that IPAC countries strengthened their climate action between 2000 and 2020 in terms of both policy adoption and policy stringency, although individual countries progressed at different paces. Policy mixes in many countries changed from cross-sectoral to a more sectoral focus and from non-market to market-based approaches. Importantly, results suggest a positive relationship between stronger climate action and greater emissions reductions but further analysis is needed to fully assess policy effectiveness.
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03/11/2022
Accelerating the transition to net zero greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is urgently required to contain the risks of climate change. As countries seek to reduce GHG emissions, they can employ or reform a wide range of policy instruments. This report tracks how explicit carbon prices, energy taxes and subsidies have evolved between 2018 and 2021. This is an important subset of the policy instruments available to governments. All instruments considered in this report either directly change the cost of emitting GHG or change electricity prices. Reforming these instruments could help to meet climate targets, lead to cleaner air and water, and improve public finances. The report covers 71 countries, which together account for approximately 80% of global GHG emissions and energy use. Explicit carbon prices, as well as energy taxes and subsidies are detailed by country, sector, product and instrument. The use of a common methodology ensures comparability across countries. Summary indicators facilitate cross-country comparisons and allow policy makers and the public to keep track of progress made and identify opportunities for reform.
02/11/2022
This paper explores what the first global stocktake (GST1) under the Paris Agreement could usefully do in relation to two elements of its mandate on adaptation, namely, to review the adequacy and effectiveness of adaptation, and to enhance the implementation of adaptation action. This paper also discusses potential outputs from GST1, and how they could facilitate the intended outcomes of the process on adaptation, taking into account a learning-by-doing approach. This paper highlights that a comprehensive collective assessment of the adequacy and effectiveness of adaptation requires data that is currently not available for various reasons. Nonetheless, this paper finds that the GST’s ability to incorporate learning and its scope for continuous improvement provides an important opportunity to develop, apply and refine approaches and methodologies over time to better address the GST’s mandate on adaptation in subsequent cycles. The paper concludes that the GST1 process could help to inform and enhance Parties’ adaptation efforts by identifying priority data needs and gaps, increasing understanding of different approaches to assessing adaptation actions, identifying enabling factors for effective adaptation, and building linkages with parallel processes including on the Global Goal on Adaptation. In this way, the GST1 could play an important role in helping to set a foundation for improved approaches and data on adaptation over time that can feed into future GSTs and support the long-term goals of the Paris Agreement.
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02/11/2022
“Authorisation” is a new but as yet undefined component of the guidance for implementation of Article 6 of the Paris Agreement. Authorisation is important as it triggers both corresponding adjustments and reporting requirements. This paper identifies and analyses open questions related to what is authorised, by what process, for what purpose, the format and timing of authorisation, and how any ex-post changes to authorisation can be made. The answers to these questions can affect the attractiveness for Parties and the private sector to participate in Article 6 cooperation. The paper also outlines areas of Article 6.2 guidance that could be usefully clarified at the international level, and implications of different options for the domestic implementation of Article 6 authorisation provisions, drawing from examples of a few frontrunner Parties who have already established bilateral agreements and domestic structures for international cooperation under Article 6. The paper concludes that some of the open questions could be clarified at the international level, such as how to report any changes to authorisations and if the authorisation needs to be provided concurrently by the participating Parties. Other questions could be clarified at the national level by the participating Parties providing the authorisation. These include whether participating Parties can choose to include additional elements in their authorisations, and which roles authorised entities could play.
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02/11/2022
Water infrastructure investments are typically capital-intensive and long-lived, involving significant costs and benefits. Their performance over operational lifetimes is highly dependent on the vagaries of the hydrological cycle and subject to the risks and uncertainties associated with climate change. The challenge is to make the best use of scarce financial resources to deliver desired water services in the context of these complicating factors. Ideally, planning for water-related investments should be robust to known hazards and flexible to adapt to an uncertain future. This paper presents a conceptual and analytical framework to sequence water-related investments along “Strategic Investment Pathways”. This approach considers a range of diverse investments over multiple scenarios and evaluates options relative to stakeholder-defined goals. It explicitly considers key dynamic processes, interdependencies and feedbacks within the water system. The aim is to inform investment decisions that contribute to water system resilience through effective and adaptive management over time.
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19/10/2022
Ce blog d'Arnaud Rouget, Directeur du programme Afrique de l’Agence internationale de l’énergie, analyse les perspectives et enjeux de l’accès à l’électricité sur le continent africain. Les défis sont nombreux, mais les opportunités pour l’Afrique le sont tout autant.
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22/09/2022
This report provides disaggregated data analysis of climate finance provided and mobilised in 2016-2020 across climate finance components, themes, sectors, and financial instruments. It also explores key trends and provides insight relating to the distribution and concentration of climate finance provided and mobilised across different developing country characteristics and groupings. The concluding chapter of the report provides further insights on the impacts and effectiveness of climate finance, as well as meaningful mitigation action and transparency on implementation. The findings complement the OECD report Aggregate Trends of Climate Finance Provided and Mobilised by Developed Countries in 2013-2020.
19/09/2022
Éoliennes, panneaux solaires... : ces technologies font l’objet d'une demande croissante et sont gourmandes en minerais. M. Fatih Birol, Directeur exécutif de l’Agence internationale de l’énergie (AIE), fait le point sur la situation d'un secteur crucial pour la transition vers des énergies propres.
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06/07/2022
La consommation de médicaments croît, et avec elle, la production de déchets pharmaceutiques. Ces déchets ont des effets délétères tant sur l’environnement que sur notre santé. Comment gérer les déchets pharmaceutiques des ménages ? Réponse dans le blog de Frithjof Laubinger, économiste de l’environnement à l’OCDE.
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29/06/2022
The OECD-FAO Agricultural Outlook 2022-2031 provides a consensus assessment of the ten-year prospects for agricultural commodity and fish markets at national, regional, and global levels, and serves as a reference for forward-looking policy analysis and planning. Projections suggest that, following a business-as-usual path, SDG 2 on Zero Hunger would not be achieved by 2030 and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from agriculture would continue to increase. To achieve the Zero Hunger target while reducing direct GHG by 6%, overall agricultural productivity would need to increase by 28% over the next decade. Comprehensive action to boost agricultural investment and innovation, and to enable technology transfer are urgently required in order to put the agricultural sector on the necessary sustainable growth trajectory. Additional efforts to reduce food loss and waste, and to limit excess calorie and protein intakes would also be necessary. This report is a collaborative effort between the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, prepared with inputs from Member countries and international commodity organisations. It highlights fundamental economic and social trends driving the global agri-food sector, assuming no major changes to weather conditions or policies. More information can be found at www.agri-outlook.org.
23/06/2022
This annual report monitors and evaluates agricultural policies in 54 countries, including the 38 OECD countries, the five non-OECD EU Member States, and 11 emerging economies. It finds that the continued rise in agricultural support has been slower than sector growth in recent years, but has been driven to record highs mainly by temporary factors. The share of general services to the sector (including innovation and infrastructure) in total support provided to the sector has decreased to 13%. This year’s report focuses on the potential for agriculture and agricultural policies to contribute to climate change mitigation. It argues that short-term agricultural policy responses to global crises must simultaneously address current challenges and support reforms to combat climate change and distortions in international markets.
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