Select a country by clicking on the map. Drag to change focus.
Glossary
Move the slider to the desired time period. All measures are calculated using rolling 5-year averages, starting from 1995-1999 and ending in 2016-2020.
Mission
The transition to the green economy is teeming with risks and opportunities.
Our mission is to help countries identify them.
No two countries are the same
When it comes to navigating growth opportunities in the green economy,
each country is different. Each has unique production capabilities and
faces a different landscape of green growth opportunities and transition risks.
Consequently, one-size-fits-all green industrial strategy policies are
likely to fall short.
A map of green competitiveness, transition risk - and future green growth possibilities
Drawing on an expansive dataset of traded
green* products
, the Green Transition Navigator identifies countries' current competitive strengths and maps out new export opportunities that
(i) align with their existing productive capabilities, and
(ii) offer advantages in terms of technological sophistication and greater potential to open up future diversification opportunities.
The Green Transition Navigator also highlights areas of specialization which are at risk of stranding, and indicates the likely ease of
transitioning to climate compatible areas of comparative advantage.
The Green Transition Navigator is based on previous research by Mealy and Teytelboym, 2020,
which developed a quantitative methodology for measuring countries'
current green production capabilities, identifying new green export
opportunities, and predicting future green export growth.
It also incorporates recent work by
Andres et al, 2023,
which develops measures of country lock-in and transition possibilities
to climate-compatible areas of comparative advantage, based on
countries' exports of brown products.
*Green products - or products with environmental benefits - are based
on a compilation of the APEC, OECD and WTO green goods classifications.
*Brown products - those likely to decline in use if the world
mitigates climate change - come from a list of products compiled
by Andres et al, 2023.
The methodology draws on existing work in economic geography that has shown
that places are more likely to develop a competitive advantage in proximate products
and sectors that involve similar (or 'related') underlying production know-how to those
they are already competitive in (Hidalgo et al., 2007a;
Neffke et al., 2011).
It also leverages previous research on economic complexity, which has demonstrated
that developing competitiveness in more complex products or industries tends to generate
higher future growth and diversification outcomes
(Hidalgo et al., 2007a;
Hidalgo et al., 2007b;
Hausmann et al., 2007).
The Navigator measures are calculated using country-level trade data at the HS1992
6-digit level from CEPII's BACI database.
The data shown is based on annual averages in trade values for rolling 5-year-periods from 1995-1999 to 2016-2020
(where no time range is selected or shown, the data is based on the most recent period,
which is 2016-2020). This approach was taken in order to prevent the analysis from being
skewed by short-term fluctuations in trade.
Importantly, the analysis presented by the Navigator is not prescriptive or intended to be definitive. It is up to the user to consider the relative
merits of proximity and complexity, and to use and interpret the analysis presented
alongside other relevant indicators and information.
While empirical analysis has shown that countries have a higher probability of developing
future competitiveness in more proximate products, this does not mean that targeting
more distant sectors is without its benefits.
Please give credit when using the data or analysis presented here in other work. Suggested citation: Andres, P and Mealy, P (2023) Green Transition Navigator. Retrieved from www.green-transition-navigator.org.
