Greenjobs will be one of the fastest employment generating industry in India by 2025.
Though most countries are making efforts to move towards a low-carbon economy, six of them – China, Brazil, the United States, India, Germany and Japan – have created the lion’s share of greenjobs globally in the renewable energy sector at over 70%.
The “World Employment And Social Outlook 2018—Greening With Jobs” report also notes that more than 300,000 workers will be employed in the solar and wind energy sectors to meet the Narendra Modi government’s ambitious goal of generating 175 gigawatts (GW) of electricity from renewable resources by 2022.
Biofuels, hydro-power (both small and large) and wind are the other three segments in the RE sector which employ maximum number of people across the globe. With China and India moving fast towards solar and wind, 60% of all renewable energy jobs are in Asia.
Steps taken by Indian government to create greenjobs
The initiative of ‘Skill India’ under the Pradhan Mantri Kaushal Vikas Yojana (PMKVY) by the Central government has given rise to a hope that this challenge will be addressed.
The enormity of this challenge is going to increase in the backdrop of an expected addition of 12 million people to the workforce every year in India.
This establishes the need for creating both jobs and skill within the Indian economy to address future developmental goals.
The question is to identify the intervention sectors where skilled and unskilled job creation can happen to address the long term goal through a green growth and development path.
Green building and renewable energy sectors are two important components of green growth intervention.
These sectors have a huge potential for skilled job creation, and thus policy makers need to focus on them. Investment and targeted intervention can create multiplier impact on the whole economy.