July 5, 2016

The European Commission reports that, in a lively mix of political leaders and stakeholders, the OECD Ministerial on the digital economy has recognised the need for collective action to seize the benefits of digital transformation.  The OECD Declaration on the digital economy was signed on 23 June following a two-day Ministerial Meeting in Cancun, Mexico.

The OECD Ministerial meeting was the opportunity to discuss the benefits and challenges of the digital economy with country leaders and stakeholders.  Since the last Ministerial meeting in 2008 the digital transformation has accelerated and brought about unprecedented change.

The OECD leaders adopted a declaration that commits countries to future collaboration.  In particular, countries committed to cooperate to preserve the openness of the internet; identify the skills needs of the digitised economy; support data flows while developing data protection strategies; bridge digital divides; strengthen the collection of internationally comparable statistics; and develop new metrics on global data flows.  To read the Commission’s blog post in full, click here.