New Delhi: India’s green economy could support 98.5 lakh jobs by 2030 and nearly 1.3 crore by 2035, according to a new report by the International Forum for Environment, Sustainability and Technology (iFOREST), which has called for a National Green Jobs and Skilling Mission to prepare the country’s workforce for emerging opportunities.
The report, India’s Green Jobs Moment: Pathways to Build a Future-Ready Workforce, was released on Wednesday at a national conference at the India International Centre in New Delhi. The conference was organised by iFOREST in collaboration with the Skill Council for Green Jobs.
The projected jobs span sectors including renewable energy, green hydrogen, electric mobility, the circular economy and nature-based solutions.
Nature-based solutions such as agroforestry, forest restoration and mangrove restoration could alone generate about 41.5 lakh jobs, the report said. Other employment opportunities are expected to emerge in waste management, circular economy activities and pollution management.
The report highlighted India’s young population as a major opportunity for the green economy. More than one in four Indians is aged between 15 and 29, but only 5.3% of the population has technical education and 5% has received formal vocational training, it said.
“Today, the biggest constraint to the growth of every business is finding skilled manpower. We have degrees, but we don’t have skills, and the market is now saying it will reward only skill,” said Dr Shamika Ravi, Member of the Economic Advisory Council to the Prime Minister, at the report launch.
Ravi said labour markets were largely state-based and that reports such as this could help governments develop more localised policies based on economic intelligence.
“But we must also guard against the tyranny of metrics. Targets will be met, but at what cost? Skilling is not an end in itself; job creation is the outcome we must keep in sight,” she said.
The report also identified opportunities to transition workers from existing industries into emerging green sectors. It found that about 89% of assessed coal-mining roles have high transferability to metal mining, while 90% of automobile roles and 71% of thermal power roles have high or medium transferability.
iFOREST has proposed a National Green Jobs and Skilling Mission, supported by State Green Jobs and Skilling Missions and district-level Green Jobs and Skilling Cells.
The proposed national mission would coordinate occupational identification, qualification development, curricula, training, apprenticeships, recognition of prior learning, industry participation and employment outcomes.
The report proposes a National Green Jobs and Skills Taxonomy to identify occupations requiring new qualifications, existing occupations that need additional green competencies and occupations where demand is growing and training and apprenticeship opportunities need to be expanded.
At the state level, missions would align national priorities with local economic opportunities, while district-level cells would identify local demand and connect training providers with employers.
The report also calls for stronger links between education, skilling and employment, beginning at the school level and continuing through technical and vocational education, higher education, apprenticeships and workplace learning.
It recommends project-based learning on clean energy, waste, water and climate resilience in schools, along with greater career awareness about emerging occupations and a stronger focus on green sectors in vocational education.
The report also argues for longer-duration and higher-value training. Around 43% of formal training courses are currently less than six months long, it said, while many emerging occupations will require deeper technical and practical capabilities.
Releasing the report, iFOREST President and CEO Chandra Bhushan said India had the institutions, policy momentum and demographic advantage needed to build a trained workforce for the green economy.
“The priority now is to connect these capabilities to emerging demand,” he said.
Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Niranjan Kumar Sudhansu said the ministry was finalising a revision of the National Policy for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship and that green jobs and skills would be integrated into the new policy.
He also highlighted PM-SETU as a mechanism for modernising skilling, including training for high-tech jobs in green sectors.
The report said the proposed approach could support India’s net-zero target for 2070 and the Viksit Bharat@2047 vision by connecting the country’s demographic advantage with employment opportunities in the emerging green economy.
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