The current low interest rate environment poses a significant risk for the long-term financial viability of pension funds and insurance companies, as they seek to generate sufficient returns to meet promises, according to a new OECD report.

Addis Ababa - Part of the 3rd International Conference on Financing for Development, this event explored strategies to leverage Africa’s pension funds and other sources of private financing to develop Africa’s infrastructure. Ways to improve the investment climate in Africa using the recently updated Policy Framework for Investment were also be addressed.

12/10/2016 – Adults in many countries around the world display low levels of financial knowledge, fail to engage in financial behaviours that could improve their financial security and have financial attitudes oriented towards the short-term, as shown in the OECD/INFE International Survey of Adult Financial Literacy Competencies released today.

31/05/2019 - Preliminary data for 2018 show that assets in pension funds amounted to USD 27.6 trillion in the OECD area, close to 4% lower than in 2017. Calculated in national currencies, pension fund assets declined in 12 out of 34 reporting OECD countries, including some of the largest pension markets: Japan (-1.1%), the Netherlands (-1.2%), Switzerland (-0.7%), the United Kingdom (-0.3%) and the United States (-5.0%).

Each year, the OECD publishes a survey of the investment regulation of pension funds which describes the main quantitative investment regulations applied to pension funds in 77 economies. The survey questionnaire covers all types of pension plans financed via pension funds.

This annual survey monitors and compares the investment behaviour, asset levels, and performances of the largest institutional investors in each region or country covered and analyses in greater depth the general trends observed at a national level.

This annual report analyses insurance market statistics collected by the OECD to monitor the insurance industry’s overall performance and health. It covers all OECD countries plus selected Asian, African and Latin American countries.

Interview with Georges Lemaître, OECD international migration expert, on recent migration trends in the European Union.

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OECD countries have made much progress over the past decade in helping immigrants integrate in society. But much remains to be done, notably in improving how well immigrant children do at school and in finding work, and in immigrant women’s access to employment, according to a new OECD report.

The Netherlands should improve its policies to attract and retain highly skilled migrants in order to address labour shortages and strengthen its position as a knowledge-based economy, according to a new OECD report.

The Dominican Republic stands to benefit from integrating migration further into sectoral and national development strategies, says new joint OECD Development Centre – UNIBE report

OECD recommands to France to modernise and better govern labour migration

The tax burden in Luxembourg increased by 0.8 percentage points from 38.5% to 39.3% in 2013. The corresponding figure for the OECD average was an increase of 0.4 percentage points from 33.7% to 34.1%. Luxembourg’s standard VAT rate is 15%, which is below the OECD average. The average VAT/GST standard rate in the OECD was 19.1% on 1 January 2014.

This paper examines how three multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) incorporate transparency into their regulatory regimes: CITES (endangered species, especially tropical timber), the Basel Convention (hazardous e-waste), and the Kimberley Process (conflict diamonds)

If you’ve just visited the room with no windows and enjoyed the effortless push of the “deposit disposal button” followed by a stream of fresh, clean tap water to wash your hands, you could well be in an OECD city

An early leader in environmental policy, the Netherlands has decoupled greenhouse gas emissions from economic growth and virtually eliminated landfilling over the past decade. Yet a very fossil fuel-intensive energy mix and looming pressures from traffic congestion and intensive farming are creating new challenges, according to a new OECD report.

The Paris Agreement is a landmark in collective efforts on climate change and is the result of many years’ hard work. It must now be implemented.

This Policy Paper comprises the Background Report prepared by the OECD for the G7 Environment, Energy and Oceans Ministers (19-21 September, Canada). It provides an overview of current plastics production and use, the environmental impacts that this is generating and identifies the reasons for currently low plastics recycling rates, as well as what can be done about it.

The Paris Agreement is a landmark in collective efforts on climate change and is the result of many years’ hard work. It must now be implemented.

The German standard VAT rate is 19.0%, which is close to the OECD average. The average VAT/GST¹ standard rate in the OECD was 19.3% as of 1 January 2019. The previous standard VAT rate in Germany was 16% in 2006. It changed to the current level in 2007. Germany applies a reduced rate of 7% to a number of goods and services.

As part of the OECD LEED project on university support for entrepreneurship in eastern Germany, undertaken in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Regional Development, this handbook presents highlights of results of a series of case studies and a university survey.

Encouraging more people to work later in life would help the Netherlands meet its growing challenges of a rapidly ageing population and rising social spending, according to a new OECD report.

The Netherlands should increase support for workers suffering from mental health issues and their employers and tackle the continued social stigma and limited knowledge around such illnesses, according to a new OECD report.

Low growth, low interest rates and low returns on investment linked to the slow global economy are now compounding the problems of population ageing for both public and private pension systems, according to a new OECD report.

Reducing income inequality would boost economic growth, according to new OECD analysis. This work finds that countries with lower income inequality grow faster than those with higher inequality.

This expert seminar aims to get a better understanding of the features, limitations and preliminary findings from the use of SIBs, and to a lesser extent, of DIBs in developing countries from a multidimensional and multi-stakeholder perspective.

The purpose of the seminar is to provide the practical information about how to implement SIBs in Poland using international experiences. The seminar is addressed to the potential applicants interested in the implementation of SIB within the call for proposals planned to be launched by the Ministry of Economic Development.

The labour market recovery in the Netherlands is lagging behind. As of the last quarter of 2015, the unemployment rate stood at 6.7%, just one percentage point lower than its cyclical peak and three percentage points higher from its level at the start of the global financial crisis. As a result of the sluggish recovery, the unemployment rate in the Netherlands is now slightly higher than that for the OECD as a whole.

The Netherlands should improve its policies to attract and retain highly skilled migrants in order to address labour shortages and strengthen its position as a knowledge-based economy, according to a new OECD report.

Widespread increases in inequality over the past three decades have raised the question of the distribution of the growth dividends.

'31 October'; Director: Shivaji Lotan Patil; Starring: Soha Ali Khan, Vir Das; Rating:***

The Netherlands, as other OECD countries, faces the challenge of providing high quality health and long term care services to an ageing population in a cost-efficient manner.

The Netherlands has strongly benefited from globalisation, which boosted international trade, cross-border investment and economic growth over the latest decades.

This report provides an analysis of RIA in the Netherlands

Norway has made significant progress in its efforts against the bribery of foreign public officials in recent years, according to a new OECD report. But more could be done to strengthen enforcement, including by focusing on the confiscation from companies of the proceeds of bribery.

The Phase 3 Report on Switzerland by the OECD Working Group on Bribery evaluates and makes recommendations on Switzerland 's implementation and application of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions and related instruments.

Die OECD-Arbeitsgruppe gegen Bestechung bedauert, dass in Österreich bisher noch kein Urteil wegen der Bestechung von ausländischen Amtsträgern ergangen ist, obwohl seit der Ratifizierung des entsprechenden OECD-Übereinkommens vor 13 Jahren eine Reihe von Vorwürfen vorlag.

The Netherlands is failing to vigorously pursue foreign bribery allegations and must do more to enforce its foreign bribery laws. Fourteen out of 22 foreign bribery allegations have not triggered the opening of an investigation, calling into question the Netherlands’ ability and proactivity in investigating and prosecuting this crime.

Ukraine has achieved remarkable progress on anti-corruption reforms since the 2014 Revolution of Dignity. Despite these major achievements, there is a serious risk of backsliding on reforms, according to a new OECD report.

This spotlight report draws upon the OECD report Equity and Quality in Education: Supporting Disadvantaged Students and Schools.

Did you know that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development helped to lay the groundwork for the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals? Even though Development is part of our name, there are many people who don’t realise just how much of our resources are devoted to developing economies and not only to the development of the OECD’s 34 member countries.

This seminar will provide an opportunity for participants to share experiences on issues such as the influence of accelerated commercialization of education and a knowledge-based society.

The Secretary-General, Mr. Angel Gurría, will visit The Netherlands on 13th and 14th of March 2013, to attend the 2013 International Summit on the Teaching Profession. He will also go to The Hague and hold a bilateral meeting with Mr. Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Finance Minister.

Successful education systems guarantee that all students succeed at high levels. As this month’s PISA in Focus notes, some school systems not only do well on international assessments, like PISA, they also manage to minimise the difference between the best- and poorest-performing students.

In a drive to raise the quality of classroom teaching and boost student performance, Dutch education authorities are encouraging teachers to learn from each other through a process of peer review.

This review report for the Netherlands provides, from an international perspective, an independent analysis of major issues facing the Dutch evaluation and assessment framework in education, current policy initiatives and possible future approaches. This series forms part of the OECD Review on Evaluation and Assessment Frameworks for Improving School Outcomes.

Around one in seven students in the 13 OECD countries and economies that took part in the first OECD PISA international assessment of financial literacy are unable to make even simple decisions about everyday spending, and only one in ten can solve complex financial tasks.

ICT has influenced almost all aspects of our lives and has changed the way we communicate, work and socialize. Education plays a key role in ensuring that everyone can reap the benefits of our technology-rich world, as well as help mitigate some of the risks.

Reducing income inequality would boost economic growth, according to new OECD analysis. This work finds that countries with lower income inequality grow faster than those with higher inequality.