Human Capital and Mobility at the Service of the Green Economy

Over the course of the last decade, the uncertainty and gloomy forecasts of global poverty, inequality and climate change impact on socio-ecological systems in the next few years have given impetus to calls and widespread global resolve to decouple economic development from environmental and natural capital degradation and enhance sustainable development .
These concerns have largely informed the ongoing global shift and growing emphasis on green economy as a sustainable growth strategy to stem this scenario and to build the sustainable “Future We Want” and more recently, to “build back better” from the COVID-19 pandemic. The vision of green economy is to be realised by instituting the necessary measures, strategies and policies to facilitate sustainable development, just, inclusive and resilient societies for all.
Following the launch of the EU Green Deal in 2019, and the increasing global shift to green economy, it is envisaged that these initiatives would help to address the challenges of technical skills gaps and skills shortage in facilitating the transition to green economy.
In spite of the corresponding ongoing efforts to promote regular migration channels, skills development and to attract talent from abroad, there has been limited policy and scientific discussion on the link and the critical role of migration in contributing to the green economy. This has thus underscored the need to examine the potential of labour migration, human mobility, skills development and transfer to address the skills requirements of the green economy.
This discussion paper aims to contribute to the growing scientific and policy discussion by exploring the links between human mobility and the green economy. The discussion would help to identify points of entry and avenues to leverage labour migration in propelling the transition to greater sustainability, and building inclusive, just and resilient societies and argues for the inclusion of labour (migration) and mobility as part of green growth strategies.
By exploring existing good examples and lessons learnt, this paper identifies pointers as to how they could be replicated in other countries. Also, the paper highlights gaps in current understanding of the topic and proposes further avenues for discussion and research in this domain. The paper argues for the inclusion of labour (migration) and mobility as part of green growth strategies