Reports

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.

This paper provides detailed farm level data evidence on the dynamics of farm performance from case studies covering 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 recent sample periods of five to thirty years. An increase in productivity over time is common to all countries and most crop farm classes, but productivity dynamics vary significantly. In Australia, strong productivity growth among the most productive crop farms has led to an increase in the gap between the highest and lowest performing farms; whereas in France, Italy and the United Kingdom, productivity growth was weak among the most productive crop farms and the lowest performing farms closed the productivity gap. Productivity also increased among dairy farms, with an increasing gap between the most and the least productive farm classes in the three sample countries. The impact of policy changes on performance dynamics is analysed for decoupled payments in France and England, and dairy payments in the Czech Republic. The main findings across countries and policy implications are discussed in OECD Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Paper N°164.

While the full effects of the COVID-19 crisis on housing affordability in cities in the Czech Republic remain to be seen, the pandemic has reinforced the urgency of tackling pre-existing challenges, such as a consistent shortage of housing supply in cities and structural obstacles for urban households to access affordable housing. While the Czech national government has taken a number of emergency measures to help people keep their homes during the COVID-19 crisis, this report recommends that Czech national and local governments need to implement both direct and indirect policy instruments more effectively to shape a more sustainable and inclusive urban paradigm. Direct policy instruments consist in targeting housing affordability specifically, for example by providing more social housing to households most in need. Indirect instruments such as local land-use planning can help increase the supply of affordable housing. This report also contains the results from an innovative survey that the OECD and the Ministry of Regional Development conducted on more than 1 800 municipalities to collect data on the housing market and housing policies at the municipal level.

The past decades have witnessed unprecedented growth in global consumption of raw materials, which also lead to increased environmental pressures. As a response to these challenges, countries across the world have made the transition to a circular economy one of their policy priorities. This report develops a set of key elements of a strategic framework for the circular economy in the Czech Republic, which the government is developing (Circular Czechia 2040). It discusses the rationale for transitioning to a circular economy in the Czech Republic and provides an in-depth analysis of four priority areas: consumption and consumers, waste management, economic instruments, as well as research innovation and digitalisation. The report also suggests 40 concrete policy measures to help implement the strategic framework, along with a monitoring framework to measure the progress made. This report was co-funded by the European Union via the Structural Reform Support Programme.

This paper assesses the design of the air pollution tax in conjunction with a stringency analysis of the emission concentration limits in the Czech Republic. The analysis draws upon a detailed database containing environmental reporting by industrial stationary sources. The assessment of the emission concentration limits focuses on analysing the shift of the statutory limits between 2013 and 2017 and the corresponding real-life measured concentration on individual source basis. It provides an assessment of stringency of the air protection instrument and also of the vintage differentiation applied in the form of transitional schemes. The stringency analysis of the emission concentration limits stringency is related to the air pollution tax relief provision.

This paper presents a simulation framework developed to assess the impact of ageing on the financial sustainability of the Czech pension system. It accompanies the publication OECD Reviews of Pension Systems: Czech Republic. The framework has two components: a macroeconomic model to project long-term GDP and a cohort model to simulate the evolution of pensions. The macroeconomic model takes into account the evolution of the labour force and productivity. The cohort model simulates the career of a representative sample of the working-age population and their path in retirement. It replicates and projects the main features of the labour market, in particular, participation, wage and unemployment. It captures non-linear features of the pension system and distributional effects. The model estimates and simulates the main demographic variables of the pension system, in particular, the number of old-age pensioners and disability pensioners. It allows to simulate different policy options to close the financing gap of the pension system. Pension spending is projected to increase to 11.9% of GDP in 2060 from 8.2% in 2018, leading to increasing deficits of the pension system. Among the different options to close the financing gap, further increasing the retirement age after 2030 in line with life expectancy gains appears to be the most efficient policy measure to boost growth and reduce the financing needs. However, additional measures would be needed to close the financing gap of the pension system.

The work of teachers matters in many different ways. Not only do they provide students with the knowledge and skills needed to thrive in the labour market, but they also help develop the social-emotional skills that are vital for students’ personal development and for their active citizenship. But how do teachers best achieve this? By linking 2018 data from the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) with evidence from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) – known as the TALIS-PISA link – this report aims to identify the teacher and school factors that matter most for student achievement and social-emotional development. The report uses a data-driven approach – based on machine learning and standard regression analyses – to identify the dimensions that are most strongly linked with student outcomes, and then combines this with a careful review of theory and previous research to analyse and interpret the findings. These findings provide a rich illustration of the many ways in which teachers and school leaders might influence the success of their students, acting as a tool for educators to reflect upon their own practice. Finally, the report offers several directions for education policy.