The amount of municipal waste generated in a country is related to the rate of urbanization, the types and patterns of consumption, household revenue and lifestyles. While municipal waste is only one part of total waste generated, its management and treatment often absorbs more than one third of the public sector’s financial efforts to abate and control pollution.
The main environmental concerns relate to the potential impact from inappropriate waste management on human health and the environment (soil and water contamination, air quality, and land use).
The quantity of municipal waste generated in the OECD area has been rising since 1980 and exceeded 590 million tons in recent years (570 kg per capita). Generation intensity — i.e. kilograms per capita — has risen mostly in line with private final consumption expenditure and GDP, but there has been a slowdown in the rate of growth in recent years.
The amount of municipal waste also depends on national waste management practices. Only a few countries have succeeded in reducing the quantity of solid waste to be disposed of. In most countries for which data are available, increased affluence, associated with economic growth and changes in consumption patterns, tends to generate higher rates of waste per capital.
Obesity
Percentage of population aged 15 and above with a BMI greater than 30
Obesity is a known risk factor for several diseases such as diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, respiratory problems (asthma) and musculoskeletal diseases (arthritis). At an individual level, several factors can lead to obesity, including excessive calorie consumption, lack of physical activity, genetic predisposition and disorders of the endocrine system.
More than 50% of adults are now defined as either being overweight or obese in no less than 10 OECD countries: the United States, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Australia, Canada, Greece, New Zealand, Luxembourg, Hungary and the Czech Republic. By comparison, overweight and obesity rates are much lower in the OECD’s two Asian countries (Japan and Korea) and in some European countries (France and Switzerland), although overweight and obesity rates are also increasing in these countries. Focusing only on obesity, the prevalence of obesity among adults varies from a low of 3% in Japan and Korea to a high of 32% in the United States.
Based on consistent measures of obesity over time, the rate of obesity has more than doubled over the past 20 years in the United States, while it has almost tripled in Australia and more than tripled in the United Kingdom. The obesity rate in many Western European countries has also increased substantially over the past decade.
Gender differences are striking. In all countries, more men are overweight than women, but in just over half of OECD countries, more women are obese than men. Taking overweight and obesity together, the rate for women exceeds that for men in only two countries — Mexico and Turkey.
Net migration rate
Per 1,000 population
Migration movements include not only entries of persons of foreign nationality, on which public attention tends to be focused; they also include movements of nationals and emigrants. Net migration summarizes the overall effect of these movements. It is in more and more OECD countries the main source of increases in population.
Since 1995, Poland is the only OECD country among the countries shown in the table that has shown negative net migration on a systematic basis. Among countries showing significant increases in population (> 0.5%) over the 1995-1999 period as a result of international migration are Australia, Canada, Spain, Ireland and Luxembourg. Since then Italy, Portugal and Switzerland have joined the list. Former emigration countries (Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain) thus figure prominently among high net migration countries, a trend which is likely to continue.
There are nonetheless a number of countries where net migration is currently contributing less to population increase than was the case five to 10 years ago. These include Luxembourg, Greece, Denmark, the Netherlands and Germany. Those where it is contributing more are the same four former emigration countries as well as Austria and Switzerland. Indeed, all but eight OECD countries are showing a larger contribution to population growth from net migration in recent years. With the retirement of baby-boomers in the near future, to be replaced by smaller entering labor force cohorts, labor supply needs may well increase and OECD countries see a continuing rise in net migration.
Household net saving rates
As a percentage of disposable household income
Household saving is the main domestic source of funds to finance capital investment, which is a major impetus for long-term economic growth.
Household saving rates are very variable between countries. This is partly due to institutional differences between countries such as the extent to which old-age pensions are funded by government rather than through personal saving and the extent to which governments provide insurance against sickness and unemployment. The age composition of the population is also relevant because the elderly tend to run down financial assets acquired during their working life, so that a country with a high share of retired persons will usually have a low saving rate.
Over the period covered in the table, saving rates have been stable or rising in Austria, France, Italy, Norway and Portugal but have been falling in the other countries. Particularly sharp declines occurred in Australia, Canada, Japan, the UK and the US. Negative saving — which means that consumption expenditures by households exceeded their income — was recorded in some countries, in particular in Australia, Denmark, Greece and New Zealand.
