Green Jobs for Youth: Recommendations for the Earth Summit

Unemployment and underemployment are major concerns for youth around the world. The global economic downturn hit youth disproportionately hard, and even today, youth are three times more likely to be out of a job than adults. The Rio+20 Earth Summit has the potential to stimulate vast new investments in the green economy and generate good, green jobs for youth. Countries convening in New York City this week need to understand the urgency of this situation, and push for concrete Summit outcomes that will deliver what global youth really need.

In developing regions where numbers of youth looking for work are high – North Africa, the Middle East, South and East Asia – generating green jobs for youth should be a national imperative. In some countries, there are as many as four out-of-work youth for every adult (and statistics rarely reflect low-productivity employment, the “working poor,” an untold job crisis for youth in sub-Saharan Africa). Many of these same countries are projecting massive energy infrastructure growth, which could be green and employ youth given sensible policies (see figure).

In the U.S., where youth unemployment peaked at nearly 20% in July 2010, the picture is equally bleak. In a new report analyzing data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Brookings, we [1] found that U.S. youth are statistically slightly less likely to hold green jobs. About 11.3% of green jobs in the U.S. are held by youth, whereas youth hold 12.3% of all jobs in the country. If indirect jobs from the scaling up of green investments are included, this situation would improve.

Fortunately, there are some commonsense strategies for engaging and training the next generation of green workers. These are proactive policies that are attentive to youth and they should be part of commitments to the green economy from countries at Rio+20 next June. Clearly, there is no path toward a greener economy in 2030 if those that are entering the workforce now are still given brown economy education and training. Some concrete steps toward that goal:

• Consider age in green jobs statistics and policies. Job creation programs need to help downtrodden youth. But policies cannot fix what they cannot measure. The lack of reliable information on green jobs holders is a fundamental obstacle to defining effective green jobs programs. A UN-sponsored collaboration between the ILO YEN, UNEP and other relevant agencies should systemically monitor how much youth are benefiting from these programs and provide assistance to national labour statistics agencies on tracking these data.
• Create a youth green bank to support green entrepreneurs. Recent graduates from sustainability programs are some of the best equipped to jump-start a green economy. Governments can provide support to attract private capital for promising young green entrepreneurs. Banks can partner with community organizations, secondary schools and community colleges to train youth in green skills and entrepreneurship.
• Make green jobs for youth a priority of existing community development initiatives. This can be accomplished by fostering partnerships between green business councils, newly formed local sustainable development planning offices, and community organizations (read the ILO report on green jobs in the U.S.). Synergies are possible between green jobs for youth and microfinance, empowerment of women and other groups facing barriers to employment, adaptation to climate change, and addressing rapid urbanization in the developing world.

The growth of the green economy has the potential to help youth in developed and developing countries alike. It is universal, says UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon: “Failing to invest in youth is a false economy.” Another false choice? Deciding between the health of our planet and economic prosperity for future generations.

This post was co-written with Stefanie Woodward, a Masters student in the Yale School of Forestry. Figure credit: Radha Adhar.

[1] Kyle Gracey and Michael Davidson. Read “Green Jobs for Youth”.