Meeting of the OECD Council at Ministerial Level 2007 - Innovation: Advancing the OECD Agenda for Growth and Equity

We recommend that you bookmark this address, www.oecd.org/mcm2007.

This year's Ministerial took place at OECD Headquarters in Paris on 15-16 May 2007 under the chairmanship of Pedro Solbes, Spain's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economy and Finance. Senior officials from Japan and Poland were vice-chairs of the meeting.

The main issues discussed at the meeting included:

• Globalisation, growth and equity
• Innovation and growth
• Enlargement of the OECD and enhanced engagement with selected non-OECD countries
• Future challenges for an open global trading system

Representatives from the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the World Bank were invited to participate in the MCM. Consultations with the Business and Industry Advisory Committee (BIAC) and the Trade Union Advisory Committee (TUAC) to the OECD took place prior to the start of the meeting.  As in previous years, selected emerging and developing economies were invited to send representatives to some sessions of the meeting.

In parallel, participants were invited to join discussions at the OECD Forum 2007, which brought together leaders of governments, business, labour, civil society and the media to debate the issues on the Ministerial agenda. The Forum took place prior to the Ministerial, on 14-15 May 2007 at the Palais Brongniart, Place de la Bourse, Paris.

This was the first Ministerial and Forum under Secretary-General Angel Gurría, who took up office on 1 June 2006.