Latin American Economic Outlook 2025: Promoting and Financing Production Transformation

The 18th edition of the Latin American Economic Outlook presents policy options for a greener, more inclusive regional production structure and examines financing mechanisms to support this transformation. It highlights the need for development strategies that promote formal job creation and strengthen local capacities and strategic sectors, while aligning production structures with global standards and demands. The report’s recommendations focus on improved implementation of productive development policies; innovative financial instruments; a renewed role for development finance institutions;…

Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2025

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) presents the 2025 version of its annual report Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean amid global uncertainty and high geopolitical tension, which are worsening the three development traps facing the region: low capacity for growth; high inequality and low social mobility and cohesion; and weak institutional capacities and ineffective governance. Foreign direct investment (FDI) guided by productive development policies could address these challenges. The first chapter provides an overview of global and re…

Report on the activities of the Commission, 2024

ECLAC is one of the five regional commissions of the United Nations. Established in February 1948 and headquartered in Santiago, the Commission’s main mandate is to contribute to the sustainable development of Latin America and the Caribbean. In June  1951, the Commission established the ECLAC subregional headquarters in Mexico City, which serves the needs of the Central American countries, as well as Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Mexico, and in December 1966, the ECLAC subregional headquarters for the Caribbean was founded in Port of Spain, to serve the Caribbean subregion. In addit…

Report on the activities of the Commission, 2024

ECLAC is one of the five regional commissions of the United Nations. Established in February 1948 and headquartered in Santiago, the Commission’s main mandate is to contribute to the sustainable development of Latin America and the Caribbean. In June  1951, the Commission established the ECLAC subregional headquarters in Mexico City, which serves the needs of the Central American countries, as well as Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Mexico, and in December 1966, the ECLAC subregional headquarters for the Caribbean was founded in Port of Spain, to serve the Caribbean subregion. In addit…

Panorama of Productive Development Policies in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2025: how to escape the trap of low capacity for growth. Executive summary

Latin America and the Caribbean is caught in a trap of low capacity for growth, largely because productivity has stagnated and even declined over the past decade. Escaping this trap requires a profound productive transformation, and the way to achieve this is to scale up and improve productive development policies following the new vision that the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) has been advocating. The Panorama of Productive Development Policies in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2025 addresses four themes that were selected for their strategic importance and …

Strengthening the artificial intelligence readiness of the Caribbean. Policy Brief

Artificial intelligence (AI) systems, when applied well, could help in addressing key global challenges and advance the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). However, these potential benefits will not materialize automatically. The use of AI also carries significant risks, such as disruption to job markets and economies, loss of cultural diversity, new AI-enabled digital weapons that increase misinformation and surveillance, and threats to human rights and democracy. While AI systems could support the achievement of many of the SDGs , they could also impede the achievement of others and increa…

Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2025. Executive summary

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) presents the 2025 version of its annual report Foreign Direct Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean amid global uncertainty and high geopolitical tension, which are worsening the three development traps facing the region: low capacity for growth; high inequality and low social mobility and cohesion; and weak institutional capacities and ineffective governance. Foreign direct investment (FDI) guided by productive development policies could address these challenges. The first chapter provides an overview of global and r…

The Hummingbird Vol. 12 No. 6

Measuring the digital society to advance digital inclusion in the Caribbean

Caribbean policymakers and regulators are grappling with the challenges and opportunities associated with the digital transformation, and seeking to develop inclusive, evidence-based policies suited to Caribbean realities. Realizing the need for data related to the digital transformation, efforts are ongoing across the subregion to improve measurement systems and agree on common indicators to enable national and subregional action. One of the outcomes of a 2023 subregional workshop on the measurement of the digital society to advance digital inclusion was a draft list of subregional priorities…

Relations between Latin America and the Caribbean and China: areas of opportunity for more productive, inclusive and sustainable development

This document is a contribution by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) to discussions of the Fourth Ministerial Meeting of the Forum of China and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). It describes the areas of opportunity for advancing towards a common cooperation agenda that fosters more productive, inclusive and sustainable development It draws on the ECLAC analysis of the development traps facing the region and the strategies to overcome them through a set of vital transformations and a new generation of productive development policie…

Scaling up and improving productive development policies: 113 recommendations for Latin America and the Caribbean

In September 2024, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) presented the first edition of its new flagship publication Panorama of Productive Development Policies in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2024.1 This document fills a gap in the Commission’s catalogue of publications, which until now has not featured a regular publication addressing one of its flagship themes over the years: productive development. This report is even more important in the context of the recent ECLAC statement that Latin America and the Caribbean faces three development traps: weak capacit…

Report on the Ninth Ministerial Conference on the Information Society in Latin America and the Caribbean

Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 8 Decent work and economic growth

Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all.…

CEPAL Review No. 145

Overcoming Development Traps in Latin America and the Caribbean in the Digital Age: The Transformative Potential of Digital Technologies and Artificial Intelligence

Latin America and the Caribbean is affected by three major structural traps or challenges that are holding back its development: low capacity for growth, high inequality and low social mobility, and low institutional capacity and ineffective governance. These challenges are deeply interconnected and feed back into each other, and the result is a vicious circle of productive stagnation, social exclusion and institutional fragility. However, digital transformation and the use of new technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) offer a unique opportunity to break this cycle. This document ex…

The Hummingbird Vol. 12 No. 1

Panorama of Productive Development Policies in Latin America and the Caribbean, 2024: How can the region advance the great productive transformation it needs?

For Latin America and the Caribbean to break from the trap of low growth and low productivity in which it is mired, the region will need to build more sophisticated and diversified economies and bring about virtuous structural change. This will entail a long-term effort, not least the continued improvement of economic fundamentals. To this end, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) has urged the countries of the region to scale up and enhance their productive development policies, adopting a new approach that differs substantially from what has hitherto been refer…

Latin American Economic Outlook 2024: Financing Sustainable Development

In order to fund their ambitious sustainable development agendas, Latin American and Caribbean countries need to expand their financing sources. This 17th edition of the Latin American Economic Outlook proposes a series of policy options to mobilise the necessary resources, based on co-ordinated actions between policy makers, the private sector and their international partners. It argues that public resources should be invested more efficiently, tax better collected and debt better managed. Even with those improvements, private resources will be equally crucial, as public revenues will not be …

CEPAL Review No. 144

The Hummingbird Vol. 11 No. 12