Economics, Latvia, Legislation, Markets and Companies

The Latvian Ministry of Foreign Affairs informed the Cabinet of Ministers on the progress in membership talks. The various line ministries responsible for the accession process have engaged in technical reviews with the 21 committees specified in the OECD Roadmap. The OECD committees have been provided with detailed information on Latvia’s correspondence with the OECD guidelines in the respective fields, and OECD experts arrive on fact-finding missions to Riga. Since the beginning of 2014, representatives from the committees of Trade and Export Credits, Corporate Governance, Fisheries, Competition, Regulatory Policy, Public Governance, Financial Markets, Insurance & Private Pensions, and the Economic and Development Review as well as the Statistics Directorate have conducted a total of eleven missions to Riga.

Several OECD committees have carried out evaluations of the situation in Latvia: the Working Party on Export Credits made an evaluation of Latvia’s export credit system; the Working Group on Bribery in International Business Transactions adopted a Phase 1 Report on Latvia; the Working Party on State Ownership and Privatisation Practices conducted a preliminary review of Latvia’s position relative to the OECD guidelines on Corporate Governance of State-Owned Enterprises; the environmental policy of Latvia and its institutional framework were presented to the Environmental Policy Committee; and the Digital Economy Policy Committee was introduced to the situation regarding the security of information systems and networks, and Latvia’s achievements and future challenges in the IT sector.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs noted that since the necessary information is being presented in a timely manner by the responsible institutions, and because of the effective cooperation established with OECD committee experts, technical review discussions are going according to schedule. This leads to hope that the talks may be concluded by the end of 2015.

The next report on the process of Latvia’s accession to the OECD will be prepared in February 2015.