Publications & Documents

This work leverages globally consistent data on parks from Google Maps, in combination with the computational power of Google Maps Directions API to quantify accessibility to parks across nearly 500 metropolitan areas in six countries: Estonia, France, Greece, Mexico, Sweden, and the United States. We combined high resolution population data from Worldpop with parks data and navigation estimates to measure: (1) Fraction of the population with access to parks within a 10-minute walk; and (2) the median walking time to the closest park. We find large differences in access to parks between countries, as well as large variability across cities and their respective commuting zones. To demonstrate how this framework can support cross country comparisons and efforts to track progress towards SDG11, we assessed access to parks by income group in selected countries, finding that the median walking time to a park is shorter for residents of low income neighbourhoods both in French and American metropolitan areas.

This publication presents the results of the Second Round Peer Review on the Exchange of Information on Request for Mexico.

This paper estimates the pass-through of monetary policy rates into five lending rates in Mexico using auto regressive distributed lags models (ARDLs) and taking into account several financial market characteristics. Results show that the pass-through of monetary policy into the average short-term lending rate is full and fast, as it takes around 3 months to be fully transmitted. However, the pass-through is heterogeneous across credit markets, being especially weak in the mortgage and automotive credit markets. A higher market concentration in the credit sector is associated with a higher level of the corresponding lending rate. Other financial market characteristics, such as the measure of bank profitability and the ratio of capital to bank assets, are also found to affect the long-run level of one or more lending rates. Higher competition in credit markets and reducing asymmetric information would improve the transmission of monetary policy and contribute to reduce the level of lending rates.

Being able to swim empowers individuals to make choices, have agency, and be free to choose core aspects of their life, such as working safely on or near water. It is also associated with lifelong health benefits and reduces the risk of drowning. Using data from the Lloyd’s Register Foundation World Risk Poll 2019, this paper provides the first global estimates of adults’ ability to swim without assistance. Individuals in high-income countries are considerably more likely to report being able to swim without assistance than individuals in low-income countries. Disparities also exist within countries. In particular, women are less likely to be able to swim without assistance than men in virtually all countries, birth cohorts, and levels of education. Investing in reducing inequalities in life skills, such as swimming, can foster economic development and empowerment, especially in light of threats, such as climate change.

Understanding adults’ attitudes towards the environment is necessary to gauge the opportunities and challenges of creating effective and politically-feasible climate policies. Using data from the Wellcome Global Monitor 2020, the European Social Survey (Round 8), World Values Survey and EM-DAT, this paper examines how adults’ environmental attitudes vary within and across countries and details how environmental attitudes are associated with adults’ engagement in pro-environmental behaviours and support for environmentally-friendly policies. The paper explores whether the extent to which individuals prioritise the environment over the state of the economy or vice versa depends on individuals’ exposure to natural disasters or negative labour market conditions. Results indicate that people’s economic vulnerability and the sectors they work in impact their attitudes towards their environment and support for public policy. Furthermore, the findings suggest that increases in unemployment and exposure to natural disasters influence the extent to which individuals prioritise the environment.

This report explores ways for Mexico’s supreme audit institution, Auditoría Superior de la Federación (ASF), to strengthen its use of analytics. While the report focuses on the use of data to enhance the detection of integrity risks, it also recognises the implications of better analytics for the ASF’s broader digital transformation strategy. It offers a range of proposals for enhancing ASF’s data governance and embedding analytics into strategic initiatives. It also looks at building ASF’s analytics capacity, including addressing integrity considerations through better co-ordination, digital skills development and nurturing a data-centric culture.

To support Mexico’s supreme audit institution, the ASF (Auditoría Superior de la Federación), in fulfilling its mandate, this report analyses good practices in OECD countries for incorporating governance issues into public works audits. It provides examples and assesses different strategic considerations for ASF’s infrastructure audit organisation and practices, including objectives and resources. Finally, it analyses infrastructure auditing practices in the context of emergencies.

Individuals’ access to finance is particularly low in Mexico. Widening access to finance would boost growth and inclusion. This paper uses microdata from the National Survey for Financial Inclusion to assess the drivers of and the barriers to people’s financial inclusion in Mexico. Results show that working in the formal sector, the level of wealth and income, educational attainment, and age are the socio-economic characteristics that most affect the likelihood of holding any formal financial product. The relative importance of these characteristics, however, varies across financial products. Economic barriers to individuals’ financial inclusion are strongly associated with widespread informality and a low level of education and income. These results suggest that financial education programmes and credit registries considering a wider set of data to assess informal workers' credit worthiness would be promising avenues to help more Mexicans access financial services.