Reports

Italy’s start-up visa aims to make the national start-up ecosystem more easily accessible to foreign talent, rich with knowledge and skills, and more integrated into global markets. Government reports show that the programme has not yet achieved a critical scale. The analysis of similar initiatives in Chile, France, Ireland and Portugal identifies five gateways for attracting more foreign entrepreneurs, such as an effective policy outreach, smooth inter-institutional co-operation across the migratory process, and the provision of sound support services for a 'soft landing' of entrepreneurs upon arrival. These takeaways may also inform new talent attraction policies targeting remote workers, an expanding group in the context of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) regularly conducts in-depth peer reviews of the energy policies of its member countries. This process supports energy policy development and encourages the exchange of international best practices and experiences. In 2019, France put its target to reach net zero emissions by 2050 into law and updated its energy transition framework the following year with a new National Low-Carbon Strategy and 10-year energy plan. However, France’s energy transition has experienced significant delays, and implementation remains challenging despite the many reforms underway. Moreover, new European Union climate goals will compel the French government to upgrade its 2030 targets and track progress more stringently. For decades, French power generation has produced a relatively low level of carbon dioxide emissions compared with similar economies, owing to the significant share of nuclear energy. However, the country’s nuclear fleet is ageing, and overall emissions are rising because energy consumption across the economy as a whole remains dominated by fossil fuels, notably in transport. Maintaining low-carbon power generation as a base for further decarbonisation and electrification requires timely decisions on the future electricity mix and accelerated investments. France’s economic recovery plan from the Covid-19 crisis and its 2030 investment plan will help accelerate its energy transition by driving progress in sustainable mobility, building retrofits and hydrogen. This report includes a series of recommendations to support France’s efforts to tackle these challenges and to meet its energy and climate goals.

Enterprises are a key provider of education and training for adults across OECD countries. Yet, policy-makers lack a detailed understanding of how training in enterprises takes place. This report opens the black box of training and informal learning in enterprises by providing in-depth insights on: i) what training and learning opportunities enterprises provide; ii) why they provide training (or not); and iii) how they make decisions about training. It presents new evidence from 100 qualitative cases studies in five countries: Austria, Estonia, France, Ireland and Italy. The findings will assist governments and social partners in designing and implementing better policies in support of training in enterprises.

This report offers an initial overview of the available information regarding the circumstances, nature and outcomes of the education of schoolchildren during the first wave of COVID-19 lockdowns of March-April 2020. Its purpose is primarily descriptive: it presents information from high quality quantitative studies on the experience of learning during this period in order to ground the examination and discussion of these issues in empirical examples. Information is presented on three interrelated topics: the nature of the educational experience during the period of lockdowns and school closures; the home environment in which education took place for the vast majority of schoolchildren; the effects on the mental health and learning outcomes for children during this period. The data come primarily from 5 countries (France, Germany, Ireland, the United Kingdom and the United States) with additional information on some aspects for 6 additional countries (Australia, Belgium (Flanders), Canada, Finland, Italy and the Netherlands). This report will be of interest to policy makers, academics, education stakeholders and anyone interested in a first international empirical analysis of the effects of the pandemic on the lives and education of schoolchildren.

How can governments support the private sector’s contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)? This book investigates the contribution of firms to the SDGs, particularly through their core business, taking into account inter-sectoral linkages and global value chains, using novel techniques and data sources. Despite the fact that the private sector has the potential to contribute to a wide range of SDGs, and that many firms find it economically viable to develop sustainable products and services, firms still face significant hurdles in their sustainability transition. Based on this new evidence, this book provides some recommendations on the design of industrial policies to enhance the contribution of businesses to the SDGs.

La crise du COVID 19 a confirmé le rôle des autorités locales pour faire face aux différents effets de la mondialisation. En France, comme généralement dans les pays de l’OCDE, c’est à l’échelon régional qu’est allouée la responsabilité de produire et de mettre en oeuvre les stratégies de développement économique, innovation et internationalisation. Ce document de synthèse tire les principales leçons des travaux statistiques et des analyses des politiques publiques relatives à l’internationalisation des régions françaises menés par l’OCDE. Il propose une méthodologie originale afin d’identifier le positionnement des régions dans la mondialisation, l’applique au cas des régions françaises et confronte ses observations statistiques aux stratégies d’internationalisation retenues par les régions. Des dispositifs de gouvernance pluri-niveaux dans lesquels s’inscrivent les acteurs de l’internationalisation des territoires sont aussi présentés.

Increasing productivity at farm level is a key policy objective across most countries and fundamental to the overall performance of agricultural and food systems. This paper applies dynamic statistical methods to farm level data in order to identify the determinants of farm performance over time, in terms of productivity and measures of local sustainability. The analysis sheds light on the effects of policies on productivity, and the links between productivity and sustainability outcomes. It draws on key findings from seven case studies: crop farms in Australia, France, Italy and the United Kingdom (England and Wales); and dairy farms in the Czech Republic, Denmark and Norway, with different sample periods, from the most recent three decades to the last five years. A key finding is that policy changes increasing the degree of decoupling of payments have a positive impact on productivity. Furthermore, with the right incentives, productivity growth can be more locally sustainable insofar as farms can produce more output with less inputs that harm the environment. The detailed background work on the seven samples of crops and dairy farms in the above countries is available in OECD Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Paper N°165.