The OECD Economic Outlook is the OECD's twice-yearly analysis of the major economic trends and prospects for the next two years. The Outlook puts forward a consistent set of projections for output, employment, prices, fiscal and current account balances.

A longer lasting and more intensive coronavirus outbreak, spreading widely throughout the Asia Pacific region, Europe and North America, would weaken prospects considerably. In this event, global growth could drop to 1½ per cent in 2020, half the rate projected prior to the virus outbreak.

The coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak has already brought considerable human suffering and major economic disruption.

China, Japan and Korea have deployed a multiplicity of co-operation efforts at different levels of government to promote air quality and curb transboundary pollution.

Many regional trade agreements (RTAs) contain chapters and articles that are environmentally specific. But Parties can elect to more broadly incorporate environmental objectives in their RTAs to promote their environmental concerns in such agreements.

National development banks (NDBs) and development finance institutions – domestically focused, publicly owned financial institutions with a specific development mandate – are poised to play a role in bridging the investment gap for climate-compatible infrastructure in developing countries.

The investment choices make in the coming years will either lock-in a climate-compatible, inclusive growth pathway, or a high-carbon, inefficient and unsustainable pathway for decades to come.

Embracing new technologies that could enable drastic reductions in GHG emissions will be key to delivering low-emissions pathways for growth, but it is not always obvious what the big breakthroughs will look like.

Investments in water and sanitation are a prerequisite to deliver on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in particular on SDG 6 ensuring availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all.

Based on an in-depth literature review and responses to a survey among OECD member countries, this paper discusses the use of flexibility mechanisms in environmental regulations.