After the financial crisis, G20 Leaders pledged to work together to ensure a lasting recovery and strong and sustainable growth over the medium term by implementing the G20 Mutual Assessment Process (MAP). To meet this goal, they launched the Framework for achieving strong, sustainable, and balanced growth, which is being implemented in the G20 Framework Working Group (FWG). The OECD actively participates in the FWG.

As a part of its wider contribution to the Framework, the OECD has launched its Going for Growth report, often at the margins of the G20 Finance Minister and Central Bank Governors meetings, which identifies and assesses G20 countries’ progress to advance structural reforms that could boost sustainable and inclusive growth.

With the pandemic outbreak, the OECD contributed under both the Saudi and Italian Presidencies in 2020 and 2021 to the Action Plan adopted by Finance Ministers to overcome the economic crisis and its social consequences, leveraging its analysis on structural policies for the recovery and the latest edition of the Going for Growth. The OECD has also provided the latest insights on the global economic outlook and policy responses to the crisis in G20 economies.

The Italian G20 Presidency has also put forward several initiatives to consolidate the G20’s crisis response and the transition towards a more sustainable, inclusive, balanced and resilient global recovery. Under Italy’s leadership, the G20 has updated and monitored the implementation of the G20 Finance Ministers’ and Central Bank Governors’ (FMCBG) Action Plan and reinforced its recovery and environmental dimensions. The Italian Presidency has also advanced discussions in the FWG on the G20’s monitoring of risks to the global economy, with a particular focus on macroeconomic policy settings through the recovery and climate change, which have been supported by OECD contributions on the economic impacts of environmental policies.

The OECD contributed to the design of the G20 National Growth Strategies under the Australian Presidency (2014), which aimed at lifting the global GDP by 2% above the baseline by 2018 (2-in-5 ambition). Since then, the OECD, together with IMF, has been monitoring, assessing and quantifying the implementation of the National Growth Strategies to reach the 2-in-5 ambition.

Under the Chinese Presidency (2016), G20 leaders agreed on an Enhanced Structural Reform Agenda, which identifies nine priority areas of structural reform and a set of guiding principles. The OECD supported this agenda by delivering to Ministers during the German Presidency, a report on the Enhanced Structural Reform Agenda which assesses progress in structural reforms under the nine priority areas.

Under the German Presidency, in 2017, the G20 countries adopted G20 principles to enhance the resilience of the G20 economies. The OECD provided support for the Principles by producing a Policy Paper on Economic Resilience and Structural Policies.

To support the Argentine Presidency’s priority on the future of work in 2018, the OECD delivered an overview paper on the macroeconomic implications and policy needs of new breakthrough technological advances for the future of work. The OECD also prepared papers on tax policies and competitive conditions that informed the G20 Menu of Policy Options for the Future of Work.

In 2019, the OECD contributed to the Japanese Presidency work on fiscal challenges and inclusive growth in ageing societies.
Under Saudi Arabia’s Presidency in 2020, as part of discussions around the macroeconomic policy response to the pandemic and the G20 FMCBG Action Plan, the OECD put forward the report New Horizons: Structural Policies for a Strong Recovery and a Sustainable, Inclusive and Resilient Future. The OECD also provided analytical support to Saudi Arabia’s G20 priorities through its paper on Enhancing Equal Access to Opportunities for All in G20 Countries.

In 2021, the OECD has delivered to the Italian G20 Presidency detailed analysis regarding digitalisation and productivity, which has served to inform Italy’s G20 Menu of Policy Options - Digital Transformation and Productivity Recovery endorsed by FMCBGs in July 2021. This contribution focused on 3 key issues: i) addressing the twin issue of productivity slowdown and rising gaps in productivity and wages; ii) harnessing the opportunities and addressing the challenges of the development of digital platforms in G20 countries, highlighting policy options to boost their diffusion to reap their productivity and resilience benefits while addressing their disruptive effects, including those related to job quality and social protection; and iii) investments in intangible assets complementary to digital diffusion, such as skills, information, innovative property, logistics and organisational capital and their potential to reverse the global productivity slowdown and increase resilience to shocks such as the COVID-19 crisis.