Events | News | Towards Green Growth | Further Reading 

What's New   Featured event: 27/02/2012: OECD-CEDEFOP Skills for a Low-carbon Economy, organised by the Co-operative Action Programme on Local Economic and Employment Development (LEED).   Publication: 14/02/2012:  Economic Survey of Germany 2012, including a chapter on exploiting new sources of growth in climate change mitigation   Article: 07/02/2012: Published in Europe’s World Green Growth: Making it Happen   31/01/2012: Focus on Greening cities, regions and communities   31/01/2012: Green growth in action in Korea   Publication: 25/01/2012: Enhancing Capacity for Greening Development   Brochure: 25/01/2012: Overview of OECD work on green growth    11/01/2012: Launch of the Green Growth Knowledge Platform

Enhancing Capacity for Greening Development

 

Rio+20 Conference, June 2012

 

The United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development will be held in Rio de Janeiro in June 2012, with the goal of securing renewed political commitment for sustainable development, assess the progress to date and the remaining gaps in the implementation of the outcomes of the major summits on sustainable development, and address new and emerging challenges. OECD work on green growth will be a core part of the OECD contribution to Rio+20. Read the OECD inputs to the Rio+20 compilation document.

 

December side event

 

In the margins of the 2nd Intersessional Meeting for Rio+20, 15-16 December, New York, the OECD and WTO hosted a side event on “Implementing green growth:  the role of policy action and the multilateral trading system”, to highlight how green growth policy mixes can accelerate progress towards sustainable development in both developed and developing country contexts and to promote a better understanding of the nexus between green economy and international trade. Read more about the side-event.

 

Towards Green Growth publications   The Towards Green Growth package was published on 25 May during a public session of the 2011 OECD Ministerial Council Meeting. These reports respond to a request from Ministers of the 34 countries who signed a Green Growth Declaration in 2009, committing to strengthen their efforts to pursue green growth strategies as part of their responses to the crisis.    "Ministers welcomed the Green Growth Strategy and provided guidance on future work. They agreed that green growth tools and indicators can help expand economic growth and job creation through sustainable use of natural resources, efficiencies in the use of energy, and valuation of ecosystem services.  Ministers noted that innovation, supported by a strong intellectual property rights system, is a key to countries’ abilities to achieve economic growth, create green jobs, and protect the environment." OECD Ministerial Council Meeting 2011, Chair's Summary   Read more about OECD Week 2011.

Towards Green Growth publications

 

Why green growth?

 

The crisis convinced many countries that a different kind of economic growth is needed. In response, many governments are putting in place measures aimed at a green recovery. Together with innovation, going green can be a long-term driver for economic growth, through, for example, investing in renewable energy and improved efficiency in the use of energy and materials.

 

By analysing economic and environmental policies together, by looking at ways to spur eco-innovation and by addressing other key issues related to a transition to a greener economy such as jobs and skills, investment, taxation, trade and development, the OECD can show the way to make a cleaner low-carbon economy compatible with growth.

 

Towards Green Growth provides recommendations to help governments to identify the policies that can help achieve the most efficient shift to greener growth, focusing, for example, on:

• green jobs and social aspects
• green taxes and regulatory approaches 
• industrial restructuring and renewal
• fiscal consolidation  
• green technologies  
• peer reviews  
• co-operation between OECD countries and emerging economies
• involvement of stakeholders

 

"We need to make growth greener, to make our economic and environmental policies more compatible and even mutually-reinforcing.  This is not just a matter of new technologies or new sources of renewable, safe energy.  It is about how we all behave every day of our lives, what we eat, what we drink, what we recycle, re-use, repair, how we produce and how we consume."   OECD Week 2011: Better Policies for Better Lives - A message from OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría.

"The rewards of greening the world's economies are tangible and considerable, the means are at hand for both governments and the private sector, and the time to engage the challenge is now."'   UNEP, Towards a Green Economy: Pathways to Sustainable Development and Poverty Eradication

 

Key OECD documents on green growth

• The Green Growth Strategy: Reshaping the OECD’s work agenda for the years to come (flyer outlining the next steps for green growth) (Dec 2011)
• Overview of OECD work on green growth (brochure) (Dec 2011)
• Towards Green Growth: A summary for policy makers (brochure) (May 2011) (Chinese | French | German | Italian | Japanese | Korean | Portuguese | Russian | Spanish)

 

Key publications

Benefits of Investing in Water and Sanitation (2011) Better Policies to Support Eco-innovation (2011) Cities and Climate Change (2010) Eco-Innovation in Industry: Enabling Green Growth (2010) Enhancing Capacity for Greening Development (2012) Environmental Claims: Findings and Conclusions of the Committee of the OECD Committee on Consumer Policy (2011) Greener and Smarter: ICTs, the environment and climate change (2010) Greening Household Behaviour (2011) Invention and Transfer of Environmental Technologies (2011) Linkages between Agricultural Policies and Environmental Effects: Using the OECD Stylised Agri-environmental Policy Impact Model (2010) Globalisation, Transport and the Environment (2010) OECD Green Growth Studies: Energy  OECD Green Growth Studies: Food and Agriculture (2011) (pictured) OECD Green Growth Studies: Fostering Innovation for Green Growth (2011) (pictured) Paying for Biodiversity: Enhancing the Cost-Effectiveness of Payments for Ecosystem Services (2010) Resource Productivity in the G8 and the OECD (2011) Taxation, Innovation and the Environment (2010) Towards Green Growth (2011) Tools for Delivering on Green Growth (2011) Towards Green Growth: Monitoring Progress - OECD Indicators (2011) Transition to a Low-carbon Economy: Public Goals and Corporate Practices (2010)

Further reading

 

Useful links

 

Green Growth Knowledge Platform New sources of growth From crisis to recovery OECD and the G8 OECD and the G20

 

The Innovation Strategy	International Energy Agency	International Transport Forum

Partners

	UNEP's Green Economy Initiative	UNESCAP Green Growth	Global Green Growth Institute	World Bank

Contact

Nathalie Girouard, Green Growth Co-ordinator (greengrowth@oecd.org)

 

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