Skills for Green Jobs

ILO and Cedefop conducted policy applied research into skills needs for greener economies in order to identify skills and occupations that become obsolete under low carbon trajectories and the emerging growth in the ‘green’ regime. The project commissioned 26 country studies to identify examples of good practice of national policies for greening economies complemented by identification of skills requirements and efficient skills response strategies.

OneWorld developed the South Africa country study and presented these findings at a conference in Geneva. Thereafter, the contract was extended for OneWorld to deepen the case studies and to develop the synthesis reports for six other country case studies (see list below) to contribute to ILO’s global synthesis report on ‘Skills for Green Jobs’. The objective of the assignment was to identify strategic skills development responses of the country (South Africa) in the light of environmental degradation, climate change and the global call for greening economies.

In 2015, OneWorld was contracted to co-conduct in the South African policy dialogues on green skills development with the Department of Labour, the Development Bank of South Africa and the Expanded Public Works Programme.

In 2017, OneWorld was contracted to update the South African Country Study. Recommendations include support for SMEs, existing skills development programmes, coordination of policy with skills development programmes; and national-subnational policy development and coordination. In 2018, OneWorld was contracted to develop and present a policy brief on the findings and to conduct capacity development sessions in a green skills workshop in Kigali, Rwanda.