This report reviews the experience of Panama in designing and implementing innovation policy. It presents an overview of economic and innovation indicators in the country in a comparative perspective with other economies in Latin America, and beyond and it analyses the design and implementation.

Start-up Latin America 2016 presents an update of start-up promotion policies in the region. Start-ups are becoming a reality in Latin America and public policies are playing an important role in supporting their creation and expansion. This second edition reviews and compares the experiences ...

Since the beginning of the 21st century, Panama has exhibited remarkable economic growth and has reduced the gap in terms of income per capita with high-income countries. Social progress has also been achieved, mainly through the reduction of poverty and advances in some well-being dimensions.

After a period of relatively robust growth that has allowed tens of millions of poorer households to join the global middle class, growth in Latin America has slowed recently, partly as a result of external factors.

This volume explores the governance and management of science, technology, and innovation (STI) in relation to innovation policy and governance systems, highlighting its goal, challenges, and opportunities. Divided into two sections, it addresses the role of governments in promoting innovation in Latin-American contexts as well as barriers and opportunities for STI governance in the region. The chapters tackle the role of institutions, innovation funding, technological trajectories, regional innovation policies, innovation ecosystems, universities, knowledge appropriation, and markets. Researchers and scholars will find an opportunity to grasp a better understanding of innovation policies in emerging economies. This interdisciplinary work presents original research on science, technology and innovation policy and governance studies in an understudied region.

The Dominican Republic, though the fastest-growing economy in Latin America and the Caribbean since 2010, cannot afford complacency. The COVID-19 crisis may accelerate existing global trends that created the need for reforms addressing structural weaknesses that lurked beneath the surface well before the pandemic. The Production Transformation Policy Review (PTPR) of the Dominican Republic identifies priority reforms to update the national strategy, with perspectives on agro-food and nearshoring.

Why is catch-up rare and why have some nations succeeded while others failed? This volumes examines how nations learn by reviewing key structural and contingent factors that contribute to dynamic learning and catch-up.

This review explores how Panama can enhance and harness digital government to achieve broader strategic goals at both national and local levels. It looks at institutional governance, legislation, and inter-departmental co-ordination, including institutional capacities and skills for delivering quality public services. It identifies opportunities for making public service delivery more efficient and inclusive, as well as for expanding the strategic use of data. The review provides policy recommendations to help Panama enable and sustain the digital transformation of the public sector.

The FAO Investment Centre provides a wide range of support services to help countries make more and better investments in food and agriculture. This review looks back at the work the Centre carried out with its partners in 2020. Despite a challenging year amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the Centre’s global team supported investment-related policy and sector studies to increase policy dialogue and contributed to the design, technical assistance, supervision or evaluation of investment projects in 120 countries. The Centre increasingly linked both its policy work with investment support to scale up impact. And it promoted greater knowledge sharing and innovation, while also helping to strengthen the capacity of people and institutions to make better investment decisions. The Centre continues to remain relevant by adapting its skills and expertise to keep pace with a constantly evolving investment landscape and fast-changing world and by advocating for more sustainable agri-food systems.