The 2011 Green Growth Strategy provided initial guidance to governments on how to achieve economic growth and development, while preventing costly environmental damage and inefficient resource use. What progress have countries made in aligning economic and environmental priorities since 2011? This report attempts to evaluate this progress and highlight where there is broad scope to heighten the ambition and effectiveness of green growth policy. It draws lessons from green growth mainstreaming across the OECD’s work programme, notably in terms of how governments can maximise institutional settings to seize economic opportunities surrounding the transition to a green economy, and considers ways to enrich the Green Growth Strategy based on work undertaken since its launch.
Today’s financial system is in many ways too large, too complex, and too removed from the real economy. It has become focused on short--‐term profit maximisation, it does not pay enough attention to social and environmental risks, and it leaves 2.5 billion people without access to adequate or any financial services. Banks play an important role in the economy intermediating between savers and borrowers. As such the role banks can play in contributing to or undermining sustainable development is profound. Values based banking is purposively oriented towards the development of a sustainable economy.
This publication provides an opportunity for Asia and the Pacific policymakers and stakeholders, such as those from the private sector, academia and civil society organizations, to actively engage with the global negotiations, and to lay out the financing and partnership frameworks for the development agenda beyond 2015 from the regional perspectives.
The publication calls for the Asia-Pacific region to work together to raise and channel more substantial financial resources to invest in the social sector, infrastructure development and efforts to tackle climate change in order to ensure a transformative change to bring about inclusive growth and sustainable development.
Although there is progress in developing green sectors in North America and East Asia, the key challenge facing the expansion of economy-wide green innovation and structural change in these regions is the absence of relevant policy follow-up to the green stimulus enacted during the Great Recession. The boost to green sectors provided by such measures is waning quickly, given that much of the green stimulus focused on energy efficiency.
The biggest obstacles to sustaining green growth in North America and East Asiaare major market disincentives, especially the under-pricing of fossil fuels and market failures that inhibit green innovation. A three-part strategy to overcome these obstacles would involve: first, removing fossil fuel subsidies; second, employing market-based instruments to further reduce the social costs of fossil fuel use; and third, allocating any resulting revenue to public support for green innovation and investments. Such a strategy would ensure that green growth is not about promoting niche green sectors but instigating economy-wide innovation and structural transformation in North America and East Asia.
This paper expands upon existing literature by proposing a wider definition of what constitutes green infrastructure. It then develops a holistic cost model by defining and quantifying the investment categories that should be considered part of green infrastructure. This paper achieves three main objectives. First, it advances the concept of green infrastructure as a critical tool for sustainable economic growth. Second, it develops a new cost model and attempts an initial quantification of the additional needs for green infrastructure. Finally, it outlines an agenda for further research required to provide more accurate estimates of such needs.
This paper is part of the working paper series "Infrastructure Finance in the Developing World" and is a joint research effort by GGGI and the G-24, exploring the challenges and opportunities for scaling up infrastructure finance in emerging markets and developing countries.