Just transition to environmental sustainability will require reskilling and upskilling of workers to reduce the risk of rising unemployment, poverty and inequality. Access to training, raising environmental awareness and climate literacy for current workers will be essential for the implementation of greener ways of production and service delivery. In 2011, the International Labour Organization (ILO) published the first Skills for a Greener Future report, which identified major gaps in and shortages of skills for green jobs, looked into the alignment between skills, environmental policies and institutional arrangements, and suggested policy response strategies and good practices.
Almost a decade after, in 2018-19, a new round of research was conducted. It updated information from countries covered in the previous study and included additional countries and regions. The new global report covers 32 countries which account for 63 per cent of world employment, 65 per cent of global GDP and 63 per cent of CO2 emissions. This new edition presents an expanded qualitative analysis with evidence of good practice in developed and developing countries of all income levels and quantitative estimates of occupational skills needs in two policy scenarios by 2030.