The unfolding COVID-19 crisis is challenging people, households and firms in unprecedented ways. Many affected countries introduced or announced bold measures over the last days and weeks, often with a focus on supporting the most vulnerable who are bearing a disproportionate share of the...

Policymakers often have a linear view of the world, where pulling the right levers will get the economy and society back on track after shocks and crises. This paper argues that such an approach ignores how systems interact and how their systemic properties shape this interaction, leading to an...

This policy note is an updated version of the note published end April 2020. It updates indicators and the main socio-economic consequences of the COVID-19 crisis in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) and presents the main policy priorities to be achieved, taking into consideration the most...

Job retention (JR) schemes have been one of the main policy tools used by a number of OECD countries to contain the employment and social fallout of the COVID-19 crisis. By May 2020, JR schemes supported about 50 million jobs across the OECD, about ten times as many as during the global...

COVID-19 has governments at all levels operating in a context of radical uncertainty. The regional and local impact of the COVID-19 crisis is highly heterogeneous, with significant implications for crisis management and policy responses. This paper takes an in-depth look at the territorial...

This brief discusses the different approaches by governments during the pandemic to using regulatory management tools, including regulatory impact assessments, stakeholder engagement and ex post evaluation, and how they have ensured robust regulatory oversight when regulating through emergency...

The economic upheaval resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic has led many governments to enhance their foreign investment screening mechanisms or introduce new ones – in the midst of an already steep drop of global FDI flows. Investment screening was already enjoying a heyday before the COVID-19...

This brief aims to support governments in designing gender-inclusive approaches to emergency management and recovery, building on OECD work and standards on gender equality in public life. Often due to pre-existing gender inequalities and socio-cultural norms, women have been disproportionately...

Early in the COVID-19 outbreak, there were concerns that the health crisis would develop into a large-scale food crisis similar to the 2007-08 food price crisis, when panic buying and counterproductive policies exacerbated initial supply disruptions. While food supply chains have seen...

This note provides information on the global value chain for the production of surgical masks and N95 respirators in the context of the COVID-19 crisis. It analyses the causes of the current shortage of these key medical supplies needed to prevent the spread of coronavirus, and reviews some...