The Green Workforce

  • 22/09/2008

  • Business World (Kolkata)

Green collar jobs involve different management and operational functions in environment-friendly products and services. So, green collar jobs, by definition, include blue- and white-collar jobs. Specifically, they include the design, manufacture, financing, installation, operation and maintenance of green technology and services. A green workforce encompasses professionals such as conservation workers, environmental consultants, engineers across disciplines, green building architects, socially responsible investors, organic farmers, environmental lawyers and ecology educators. It also includes vocational workers such as electricians who install solar panels, plumbers who install solar water heaters and construction workers who build green buildings or wind power farms. In a nutshell, green businesses have widened the opportunity to capture and generate employment at each stratum of the social pyramid. Across the world, green collar jobs represent an important new category of work force opportunities. These are high-quality jobs, capable of accommodating diverse and multi-disciplinary professionals in a sector that is poised for dramatic growth. The combination of these features means that cultivating green collar jobs can be effective in providing access to quality employment, meaningful, community-serving opportunities, decent living wages and other benefits. India needs a large green collar workforce to sustain a low-carbon economy in the long term. Green collar jobs are, at present, the fifth largest market sector in the US. The long process of de-carbonising India