Abstract

This report provides an overview of the efforts put forth to present and evaluate WorldScan, a long-term model of the world economy, developed at the (Central Planning Bureau)CPB. One of the pivotal activities was the organisation of a peer review of the model during a two-day workshop. The reviewers were selected both from the academic and the policy field. The main recommendations of that review were: i) Do not pursue a formal, full-scale linkage between WorldScan and the climate model IMAGE, developed at the RIVM. Instead, WorldScan should be used for separate economic analyses, which is input in the climate model. ii) Make more precise choices with respect to the underlying theories as well as with respect to the time horizon of the analyses. iii) Improve the empirical base of WorldScan. iv) Enhance the use of WorldScan for policy analyses in behalf of international policy fora. The review proved to be very beneficial for the evolution of WorldScan. Implementation of some of the recommendations has led to increased use of the model by international institutions. Since the review, WorldScan has been used in behalf of the European Union (EU), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the Energy Modelling Forum (EMF), the Centre for Global Trade Analysis (GTAP), the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and Indian Planning Commission (IPC).