The report was produced under the guidance of Ragnheiður Elín Árnadóttir, Director of the OECD Development Centre. It was led and managed by Alexandre Kolev, Head of the Social Cohesion Unit, with the support and co‑ordination of Pierre de Boisséson, Economist, under the guidance of Bathylle Missika, Head of the Inclusive Development and Partnerships Division, and Federico Bonaglia, Deputy Director.
The report is the result of data collection, analytical work, drafting and fruitful collaboration among various authors across the OECD Development Centre. Chapters 1, 3 and 5 were written by Pierre de Boisséson. Chapters 2 and 4 were written by Alexandre Kolev and Thomas Manfredi, with data analysis developed by Horacio Levy for Chapter 4. Gabriela Picinini da Silva and Johan van der Ploeg provided excellent research and data analysis assistance.
Special thanks go to Laura Alfers and Marcela Valdivia from Women in Informal Employment Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO), who respectively drafted Box 2.3 and Box 5.3.
The report benefitted greatly from a series of consultations and presentations of early versions of the thematic chapters. The OECD Development Centre expresses sincere thanks to all the presenters, discussants and participants of the Expert Group Meetings on three overarching themes: ageing and informality (25 March 2025); technological change and the employment prospects of informal workers (17 June 2025); and the vulnerability of informal economy workers to environmental risks (10 February 2026). These exchanges and the feedback received greatly helped enrich the analysis, ensure its relevance for various audiences and shape the final report.
The authors are deeply grateful to all OECD staff and non-OECD experts who provided extensive comments and suggestions: Manal Azzi, Florence Bonnet, Michael Frosch, Pawel Gmyrek, Halshka Graczyk, Marek Harsdorff, Céline Peyron Bista (ILO); Joanna de Berry, Hugo Nopo, Fiona Stewart (World Bank); Hervé Boulhol, Ricardo Espinoza, Ben Game, Thomas Liebieg, Maciej Lis, Mikaël Maes, Gioia de Melo, Hyeshin Park, Glenda Quintini, Andrew Reilly, Ji-Yeun Rim, Simon Touboul, Miranda Verlee (OECD); Aaron Gardener (Lloyd’s Register Foundation); Anders Gerdin (Sida); Philip O'Keefe (Centre for Population Ageing Research, University of New South Wales); Caroline Skinner, Marcela Valdivia (WIEGO); and Katsuhiko Yamauchi (Japan International Cooperation Agency).
The authors are also extremely grateful to all OECD colleagues who provided extensive support for the statistical analysis, publication and dissemination of data: Arnaud Atoch, David Barraclough, Alena Brin, Yavuz Coban and Samuel Pinto-Ribeiro from the Statistics and Data Directorate; and Vincent Finat-Duclos and Nobuko Miyachiyo from the Directorate for Communications.
Thanks go to Henri-Bernard Solignac-Lecomte, Delphine Grandrieux, Elizabeth Nash and Elizabeth Owuor from the Communications, Publications, and Outreach team, who supported the design and provided editorial contributions. The authors also sincerely appreciate the editing and proofreading by Marilyn Smith. Sonja Marki and Tamara Shchelkunova provided invaluable administrative support throughout the elaboration of the report.
Finally, the OECD Development Centre would like to express its sincere gratitude and appreciation to the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) for its financial contribution to the production of this report and to the KIIbIH database.