OECD Signals Slow but Uneven Progress Toward Green Transition; Urges Stronger Climate, Biodiversity, and Circular-Economy Action
SDG 13: Climate Action | SDG 12: Responsible Consumption & Production
Institutions: Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (India context)
The OECD’s Environment at a Glance Indicators report provides a cross-country assessment of environmental progress and implementation gaps across climate mitigation, air quality, water security, circular economy, biodiversity protection, and ocean sustainability.
While climate indicators reflect moderate improvement — OECD-wide greenhouse-gas emissions declined ~8% between 2010 and 2022 and renewables now account for ~30% of energy supply — fossil fuels continue to dominate energy systems and fossil-fuel subsidies exceed USD 350 billion annually, slowing transition momentum.
Air quality outcomes are mixed: average PM2.5 exposure has fallen over two decades, yet nearly 90% of people in OECD countries still breathe air above WHO safety limits, imposing health and productivity costs of up to 3% of GDP in some nations.
In water systems, stress remains acute in parts of southern OECD economies, with freshwater stress exceeding 40%, even as around four-fifths of wastewater is treated. Climate change further amplifies resilience risks for infrastructure and agriculture, especially where river basins and groundwater face depletion or pollution.
Resource pressures persist. OECD countries generate over 530 kg of municipal waste per person annually, with only ~35% recycled and modest material-productivity gains of 1–2% per year, indicating limited decoupling between economic growth and material use.
Biodiversity loss remains a major threat: one-third of assessed species face extinction, while protected areas cover ~17% of land and 8% of marine zones — well short of the 30x30 global target. Ocean ecosystems remain stressed by over-extraction, climate impacts, and plastic pollution, the latter tripling since the 2000s.
The report urges countries to scale climate ambition through carbon pricing, subsidy reform, investment in renewable energy, and climate-resilient infrastructure; strengthen urban air-quality controls, sustainable mobility, and industrial clean-tech; enhance water governance and wastewater infrastructure; accelerate reuse, recycling, eco-design and circular-economy innovation; expand and manage protected areas and restore degraded habitats; and advance sustainable ocean-economy frameworks including fisheries reform and marine-conservation finance. Importantly, the
OECD highlights persistent environmental-data gaps and calls for more transparent and comparable environmental-economic accounting to support credible policy pathways and public accountability.
For India — now shaping green-transition architecture, biodiversity missions, and blue-economy strategy — the OECD indicators underscore the importance of linked climate-biodiversity-resource governance, greater circular-economy adoption, and investment in urban air-quality and water resilience systems.
Follow the full update here: OECD Environment at a Glance Indicators