Reports

The bioeconomy brings opportunities for economic growth while tackling climate change. Fossil carbon resources can be replaced by bio-based carbon resources, especially biomass. To allow these solutions to be scaled up without threats to biodiversity and the environment, it is necessary to develop the bioeconomy as a circular economy. With this carbon management approach, other sources of carbon complement biomass: industrial waste, including gases such as CO and CO2, as well as physically and chemically recycled carbon. In the future, direct air capture (DAC) may become competitive and form part of the solution. These approaches can be considered ‘circular’ because they close material loops and keep carbon recycling in the economy rather than emitting carbon to the atmosphere. This report reviews a number of hybrid technologies that can be deployed to ‘defossilise’ economic sectors and sets out policy options to bring these technologies to commercial scale.

People with disability face persisting difficulties in the labour market. There are concerns that AI, if managed poorly, could further exacerbate these challenges. Yet, AI also has the potential to create more inclusive and accommodating environments and might help remove some of the barriers faced by people with disability in the labour market. Building on interviews with more than 70 stakeholders, this report explores the potential of AI to foster employment for people with disability, accounting for both the transformative possibilities of AI-powered solutions and the risks attached to the increased use of AI for people with disability. It also identifies obstacles hindering the use of AI and discusses what governments could do to avoid the risks and seize the opportunities of using AI to support people with disability in the labour market.

This document provides an integrated view on income-based tax incentives for R&D and innovation. It brings together the latest evidence on the adoption, design, generosity, cost and take-up of income-based tax incentives, and gives new insights into both the long-term and short-term trends in the take-up of income-based tax incentives by business and their cost to governments, including role of policy design changes. Furthermore, the report explores the scope for developing indicators that provide a more complete picture of the value of expenditure- and income-based tax relief for R&D and innovation in the OECD area and beyond.

This paper resents a measurement framework aiming to support the collection of comprehensive and internationally comparable quantitative and qualitative information on governmental innovation support programmes and instruments. It proposes a taxonomic system with definitions, classifications and reporting conventions aligned with OECD and other international standards. The framework is intended to support future OECD measurement efforts in this area and the analysis of innovation support portfolios within and across countries.

This paper examines the experiences of self-employed online freelancers working on digital labour platforms during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is based on interviews with freelancers and platform managers and experts in Belgium, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland. Their experiences during COVID-19 reveal issues of asymmetric power vis-à-vis platforms. Notably, they reported lack of transparency and certainty in their contracts with platforms, lack of power in negotiating with clients, and limited ability to engage with clients on other platforms. In addition, they often experienced difficulties in accessing government temporary supports for businesses during the pandemic. The paper puts forward policy recommendations to address these issues.

This report outlines a new methodology and provides a first exploratory analysis of technologies and applications that are at the core of recent advances in AI. Using AI-related keywords and technology classes, the study identifies AI-related patents protected in the United States in 2000-18. Among those, 'core' AI patents are selected based on their counts of AI-related forward citations. The analysis finds that, compared to other (AI and non-AI) patents, they are more original and general, and tend to be broader in technological scope. Technologies related to general AI, robotics, computer/image vision and recognition/detection are consistently listed among core AI patents, with autonomous driving and deep learning having recently become more prominent. Finally, core AI patents tend to spur innovation across AI-related domains, although some technologies – likely AI applications, such as autonomous driving or robotics – appear to increasingly contribute to developments in their own field.

This paper examines the nature and evolution of data localisation measures and their impact on business activity. It highlights that data localisation measures are growing and increasingly restrictive. By early 2023, 100 such measures were in place across 40 countries, with more than two-thirds combining local storage requirements with flow prohibition, the most restrictive form of data localisation. Insights gained from businesses operating in the e-payments, cloud computing, and air travel sectors suggest that data localisation can have unintended consequences. It not only increases operating costs, with implications for downstream users, but can also lead to increased vulnerabilities to fraud and cybersecurity risks, and reduced resilience to unexpected shocks. While international regulatory efforts have largely taken place through regional trade agreements (RTAs), this paper calls for continued monitoring of the regulatory environment with a view to informing efforts to agree on global rules that take into account legitimate public policy objectives while avoiding excessive fragmentation, especially through discussion at the WTO under the Joint Initiative on e-commerce.

The OECD AI Principles call for AI actors to be accountable for the proper functioning of their AI systems in accordance with their role, context, and ability to act. Likewise, the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises aim to minimise adverse impacts that may be associated with an enterprise’s operations, products and services. To develop ‘trustworthy’ and ‘responsible’ AI systems, there is a need to identify and manage AI risks. As calls for the development of accountability mechanisms and risk management frameworks continue to grow, interoperability would enhance efficiency and reduce enforcement and compliance costs. This report provides an analysis of the commonalities of AI risk management frameworks. It demonstrates that, while some elements may sometimes differ, all the risk management frameworks analysed follow a similar and sometimes functionally equivalent risk management process.

The digital economy is growing, with producers increasingly using digital technology to revolutionise their production processes, and with new business models being created based on the digital transformation. To improve the visibility of digitalisation in macroeconomic statistics, the Digital Supply and Use Tables (SUTs) framework has been developed under the auspices of the OECD’s Informal Advisory Group (IAG) on Measuring GDP in a Digitalised Economy. In the Digital SUTs framework, three dimensions are introduced for measuring the digital economy: the nature of the transaction (the 'how'), the goods and services produced (the 'what'), and the new digital industries (the 'who'). The OECD Handbook on Compiling Digital SUTs explains these three dimensions and includes examples. It also presents the high priority indicators that have been agreed by the IAG and includes recommended templates for producing the outputs.

Responsible science communication is crucial for fostering public trust in science and promoting evidence-based policymaking. However, in an evolving landscape shaped by the digital transformation and complex crises like the COVID-19 pandemic, science communication faces new challenges including widespread mis- and disinformation. To address these challenges, science communicators should follow key principles for responsible science communication including transparency, inclusivity, integrity, accountability, freedom and autonomy, and timeliness. Policymakers in turn are encouraged to promote these principles, invest in science communication capacity, establish crisis communication structures, support scientists in public communication, and promote scientific and digital literacy.