🇮🇱Israel

• Yozma, the venture capital catalyst (Experimentation)

  Israel put 100 million dollars of public money into ten hybrid venture funds from 1993, with foreign partners and a buy-out option, and by 2002 the country had 131 venture funds with around 10 billion dollars under management.

• Seawater desalination under private concessions (Coordination)

  Israel's Water Authority contracted private operators to build and run large seawater desalination plants under long-term concessions, and by 2022 the five largest held concessions for about 596 million cubic metres a year and supplied 33 percent of the country's fresh water, with the state buying 540 million cubic metres from them that year for about NIS 1.5 billion.

• Tel Aviv light rail Red Line (Building)

  Israel's government approved the Red Line in December 2010 at an estimated NIS 10.7 billion, and NTA, the state-owned company delivering it, began the main construction works in 2015. By October 2021 the cost estimate had reached NIS 18.71 billion, about 75% above the original, and the completion date had been postponed six times, by about five years in total. The 24 km line opened in August 2023, and in December 2025 the State Comptroller put its construction cost at NIS 18.8 billion.

• National COVID-19 vaccination campaign (Adaptability)

  Israel started COVID-19 vaccination in December 2020 through its four health funds and had fully vaccinated about 70 percent of adults by April 2021; at the end of April 2021, 55 percent of its population was vaccinated, when coverage in most OECD countries was between 11 percent and less than one percent.

• Israel Railways electrification and the Jerusalem express line, and their delays (Building)

  Israel Railways began electrifying the national network in 2000 and opened the electric express line to Jerusalem in September 2018, but by May 2020 only about 64 of 480 planned route kilometres were electrified, and the forecast completion date had moved from 2019, set in 2013, to the end of 2025, on an estimated cost of ILS 12.1 billion.

• Ministry of Labour Vocational Training Division adult courses (Learning)

  Israel's Vocational Training Division, in the labour ministry, trained about 61,000 people in 2022, against about 55,000 in 2019 and 59,000 in 2021, according to the Knesset Research and Information Center.

• Bank of Israel COVID-19 small-business credit programme (Adaptability)

  After the Monetary Committee decided on 6 April 2020 to lend banks three-year fixed-rate money for credit to small and micro businesses, the Bank of Israel had NIS 1.2 billion outstanding under the programme by 30 April 2020 and NIS 28.1 billion by 31 March 2021.

Fill a gap, file evidence or challenge an indicator at github.com/envisioning/national-capability-benchmark. The docs explain the method and decisions.