Reports

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.

The review examines how higher education institutions are supporting innovation and entrepreneurship in their surrounding communities. The study focuses on eleven universities located in six countries in Latin America: Chile, Colombia, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. The study finds that selected institutions are actively supporting entrepreneurs (university students, but also local entrepreneurs) through courses, incubation and acceleration activities. It also shows that universities are actively engaging with external stakeholders in their surrounding communities, to spur innovation through joint-research, organisation of events (such as festivals, competition). It finds that that while COVID-19 pandemic brought about some challenges, universities managed to stay afloat and keep a steady stream of support to entrepreneurs and partners. The review also illustrates the challenges that universities face when developing these activities (lack of funding, unclear regulation for intellectual property development, etc.) and highlights some opportunities that universities should leverage, particularly in the current context.

Good governance is a building block for the performance of regulators, including civil aviation authorities. This paper reports the results of a mapping of governance arrangements across 29 civil aviation authorities in Latin American and Caribbean countries, with the International Civil Aviation Organization’s South American and North American, Central American and Caribbean regions. Applying the methodology of the OECD Indicators on the Governance of Sector Regulators, the results provide a birds-eye view of the independence, accountability and scope of action of participating authorities. This paper explains the indicator methodology, summarises key data points, and presents high-level take aways.

The paper is the first in a series of two papers mapping young people’s environmental sustainability competence in EU and OECD countries that were prepared as background for the forthcoming OECD Skills Outlook 2023 publication. The papers are the results of a collaboration between the OECD Centre for Skills and the European Commission - Joint Research Centre (Unit B4) on students’ environmental sustainability competence. The second paper is titled: ‘The environmental sustainability competence toolbox: From leaving a better planet to our children to leaving better children for our planet’.

The paper is the second in a series of two papers mapping young people’s environmental sustainability competence in EU and OECD countries that were prepared as background for the forthcoming OECD Skills Outlook 2023 publication. The papers are the results of a collaboration between the OECD Centre for Skills and the European Commission - Joint Research Centre (Unit B4) on students’ environmental sustainability competence. The first paper is titled ‘Young people’s environmental sustainability competence: Emotional, cognitive, behavioural and attitudinal dimensions in EU and OECD countries.

There is a discernible and growing gap between the qualifications that a university degree certifies and the actual generic, 21st-century skills with which students graduate from higher education. By generic skills, it is meant literacy and critical thinking skills encompassing problem solving, analytic reasoning and communications competency. As automation takes over non- and lower-cognitive tasks in today’s workplace, these generic skills are especially valued but a tertiary degree is a poor indicator of skills level. In the United States, the Council for Aid for Education developed an assessment of generic skills called the CLA+ and carried out testing in six countries between 2016 and 2021. This book provides the data and analysis of this 'CLA+ International Initiative'.

Total Official Support for Sustainable Development (TOSSD) is a new metric that measures official flows, and private flows mobilised by the official sector, to support sustainable development in developing countries. This pilot study seeks the perspective of Chile (a dual provider/recipient of development co-operation) on the concept and methodology of TOSSD. It estimates TOSSD flows from Chile in support of sustainable development and carries out a light assessment of its capacity to report on TOSSD.

This report is part of the OECD Tax Policy Reviews publication series. The Reviews are intended to provide independent, comprehensive and comparative assessments of OECD member and non-member countries’ tax systems. Drawing primarily on OECD Revenue Statistics data prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the report examines the level, composition and evolution of the tax burden in Chile and explores whether tax revenues in Chile are converging to the levels raised in other OECD countries. The report also outlines a possible tax-to-GDP trajectory in Chile over the coming decade if Chile were to follow the path of countries from when they had a similar level of economic development.

Reducing air pollution is a major policy challenge, especially in densely populated urban areas where human exposure to emissions is considerable. This paper develops and examines a series of scenarios for the evolution of transport-related emissions in the area of Santiago, Chile. The analysis suggests that ramping up efforts to electrify the bus fleet may eliminate 25% of the CO2 and at least 10% of the remaining air pollutant emissions in 2050. These figures increase to 45% and 30%, respectively, if rapid electrification is accompanied by tax schemes. The paper highlights the potential synergies of policies curbing climate change and tacking air pollution from the viewpoint of urban transport.

The impact of the work of supreme audit institutions (SAIs) largely depends on the ability and willingness of the audited entities to implement the changes suggested in the audit reports issued by the SAIs. Applying behavioural insights (BI) can help SAIs promote the uptake of their audit reports and recommendations. BI is a perspective based on psychology, cognitive science, and social science that takes into account how humans actually make choices, and can be used to help design better policies. The report analyses how the SAI of Chile, the Comptroller General of the Republic (CGR), produces audit reports and monitors their follow-up. Based on this analysis, the report identifies and discusses challenges hampering the timely follow-up and identifies opportunities to use behavioural insights to address them. Ultimately, a behaviourally informed review of the auditing and follow-up process could help significantly improve the added value of the CGR’s work and thus the effectiveness and efficiency of the public administration in Chile.