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The chemical industry is one of the largest industrial sectors in the world and is expected to grow fourfold by 2060. Indeed modern life without chemicals would be inconceivable. Given the potential environmental and human health risks from exposure to chemicals, governments and industry have a major responsibility to ensure that chemicals are produced and used safely.The OECD assists countries in developing and implementing policies and instruments that protect human health and the environment, and in making their systems for managing chemicals as efficient as possible. To eliminate duplication of work and avoid non-tariff barriers to trade, emphasis has been on developing shared frameworks for gathering and assessing information on potential chemical risks. The time-tested OECD Mutual Acceptance of Data (MAD) system provides a major basis for generating savings to governments and industry. This report provides an overview of the benefits and estimates the total savings from OECD work to be more than EUR 309 million per year.

Better skills policies help build economic resilience, boost employment and reinforce social cohesion. The OECD Skills Strategy provides countries with a framework to analyse their skills strengths and challenges. Each OECD Skills Strategy diagnostic report reflects a set of skills challenges identified by broad stakeholder engagement and OECD comparative evidence while offering concrete examples of how other countries have tackled similar skills challenges. These reports tackle questions such as: How can countries maximise their skills potential? How can they improve their performance in developing relevant skills, activating skills supply and using skills effectively? What is the benefit of a whole-of-government approach to skills? How can governments build stronger partnerships with employers, trade unions, teachers and students to deliver better skills outcomes? OECD Skills Strategy diagnostic reports provide new insights into these questions and help identify the core components of successful skills strategies. This report is part of the OECD’s ongoing work on building effective national and local skills strategies.

This report looks at ways to improve the resilience of systems to deal with the unexpected arrival of large inflows of refugees and other vulnerable migrants. It begins with an overview of the recent flows of migrants seeking protection, discusses the expected economic impact of these flows, and notes what has been an unprecedented multilateral response. It then examines the process of integrating refugees and other vulnerable migrants, in terms of their economic and social outcomes, as well as specific factors of vulnerability. It also provides a comprehensive assessment of the transition policies in place to support their livelihood in destination and transit countries, as well as in origin countries upon return. Finally, the report tackles issues of anticipation, monitoring and reacting, examining the role of early warning mechanisms and the challenge of improving information so as to better monitor integration outcomes and frame policies.

The positive impacts of social protection on reducing poverty and inequality and contributing to development are well evidenced. Establishing an integrated system facilitates the provision of a social protection floor, whereby individuals are appropriately protected throughout the life cycle. This is achieved not only by making sure there is a sufficient range of programmes to cover a population’s risk profile but also by sharing information on different individuals to ensure they are linked to an appropriate programme.The Social Protection System Review is one of a small number of tools that serve to analyse how effective a country is in establishing a social protection system that responds to the needs of its people both today and in the future. The toolkit presents methodologies which can be implemented in any country, at any income level and by any institution. It is intended to generate policy recommendations that are actionable through national systems.

The world of work is changing. Digitalisation, deepening globalisation and population ageing are having a profound impact on the type and quality of jobs that are available and the skills required to perform them. To what extent individuals, firms and economies can harness the benefits of these changes critically depends on the readiness of adult learning systems to help people develop relevant skills for this changing world of work. In Brazil, the speed of population ageing is projected to be significantly faster than what has been experienced by most developed economies. At the same time, increasing integration into the global economy will create new opportunities and propel growth. But it will also affect the content of exports and the stage at which Brazil contributes for Global Value Chains (GVCs). Profound changes in the economy are to be expected in the coming decades. As these changes have not yet fully materialised, Brazilian policy makers have a window of opportunity to prepare for the transformations ahead. This report aims at providing policy recommendations, based on best practices internationally, to prepare the Brazilian adult learning system so that it is ready to support people in acquiring the relevant skills for the future.

Tackling mental health problems of the working-age population is a key issue for labour market and social policies in OECD countries, not just for health systems. Governments increasingly recognise that policy has a major role to play in keeping people with mental health conditions in employment or bringing those outside of the labour market into it, and in preventing mental illness. This report on New Zealand is the tenth in a series of reports looking at how broader education, health, welfare and labour market policy challenges are being tackled in a number of countries. The report is also the first one published after the endorsement of the OECD Recommendation of the Council on 'Integrated Mental Health, Skills and Work Policy' and assesses New Zealand's performance against the strategic policy framework agreed by all OECD countries. The report concludes that awareness and policy thinking is well developed in New Zealand but that structural and institutional weaknesses limit the provision of timely, integrated health and employment services, with particularly disappointing outcomes for the indigenous population. Against the background of the OECD Council Recommendation, the report proposes improvements in policy development and policy implementation to make youth, workplace, health and welfare policies ready for the challenge.

These case studies complement the 2018 Development Co-operation Report: Joining forces to leave no one behind. Case study contributors share knowledge and lessons on what it takes to answer the pledge of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development to leave no one behind through national and sub-national policies, strategies and programmes as well as international development co-operation projects, programmes and partnerships. The insights, good practices and lessons shared in these case studies were provided by diverse actors. These include official development co-operation ministries and agencies from members of the OECD and the Development Assistance Committee, international organisations, developing country governments, civil society organisations, business, and research bodies. The case studies highlight experiences from projects and programmes in leaving no one behind and reaching the furthest behind. They are organised and presented under two broad categories:1. Reaching and including people and places;2. The enabling role of international co-operation: policies, partnerships and data.

When Member States of the United Nations approved the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in 2015, they agreed that the Sustainable Development Goals and Targets should be met for all nations and peoples and for all segments of society. Governments and stakeholders negotiating the 2030 Agenda backed the ambition of leaving no one behind, an ambition increasingly referred to in development policies, international agendas and civil society advocacy.How can we transform this ambition into reality? Policy makers, civil society and business are asking for more clarity on how to ensure that no one is left behind in practice. What does it mean for the design and delivery of economic, social and environmental policies? How should development co-operation policies, programming and accountability adapt? What should governments, development partners and the international community do differently to ensure that sustainable development goals benefit everyone and the furthest behind first? The 2018 Development Co-operation Report: Joining Forces to Leave No One Behind addresses all of these questions and many more. Informed by the latest evidence on what it means to be left behind, it adopts a wide range of perspectives and draws lessons from policies, practices and partnerships that work. The report proposes a holistic and innovative framework to shape and guide development co-operation policies and tools that are fit for the purpose of leaving no one behind.The full report will be published in November.