By Samar Verma, PhD*
Speed Without Voice Risks Building a Fragile Green Future
In most conferences on green growth, the vocabulary is familiar: innovation, scale, speed, efficiency. Step instead into a village facing crop loss or an informal settlement coping with floods and heatwaves, and the words you hear are different: stability of income, safety, dignity, predictability. Bridging these worlds depends on how we answer two deceptively simple questions at the centre of every green initiative: who gets to design, and who bears the risk of the decisions that follow?
As India advances towards the Prime Minister’s vision of a Green Viksit Bharat by 2047, and the Mission LiFE call to make “lifestyle for environment” a people’s movement, these questions go to the heart of whether our green transition will be both fast and fair.
A historic green opportunity- and a design choice
A new assessment by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) underscores the scale of India’s opportunity. By 2047, India’s green economy could unlock about USD 1.1 trillion in market value, attract roughly USD 4.1 trillion in cumulative investments, and generate around 48 million jobs, while helping abate nearly 2.3 billion tonnes of CO₂-equivalent- close to three-quarters of India’s current annual emissions.
This opportunity spans well beyond a few flagship technologies. The CEEW report identifies 36 green value chains across three pillars – energy transition, circular economy, and bio-economy and nature-based solutions – covering everything from renewables and electric mobility to waste recovery and nature-based tourism.
The same data show that green jobs will not be evenly spread. Energy transition alone could create nearly 17 million jobs, with electric vehicle manufacturing accounting for well over half, a largely urban, factory-centric story. Bio-economy and nature-based solutions could generate around 23 million jobs in bio-inputs, agroforestry, bamboo, wetland restoration and sustainable tourism- largely rural, ecosystem-linked livelihoods. The circular economy may add another eight to nine million jobs, of which about 7.6 to 7.7 million are expected in solid waste work: collection, sorting, aggregation and recycling.
Many boardrooms may picture solar parks and EV plants. But tens of millions of green livelihoods will be in rural landscapes and in low-visibility waste and repair chains, often carried by workers whose names never appear on project dashboards. Our design choices will determine whether these jobs are formal, safe and remunerative, or remain informal and precarious.
Women and informal workers: the litmus test
The Government of India has rightly emphasised that women’s leadership and participation are central to the Amrit Kaal.
CEEW’s analysis suggests that India will need around 400 million women in the workforce by 2047 to meet its development aspirations. At current trends, we may reach only about 145 million, leaving a gap of more than 250 million women. Many of the largest green job pools-bio-inputs, agroforestry, waste management, distributed renewable energy- overlap with sectors where women and informal workers are already active, though often in low-paid, unsafe or unrecognised roles.
The report also notes that over half of India’s MSMEs are located in rural areas, and that decentralised renewable microgrids are already supporting small-scale manufacturing and processing in off-grid regions. These distributed models sit squarely within the vision of inclusive, bottom-up development and Mission LiFE’s emphasis on sustainable local solutions.
Here, the design question becomes: do we treat women and informal workers as beneficiaries at the end of the chain, or as co-architects whose knowledge and constraints shape the model from day one? Decisions around skilling, workplace safety, childcare, mobility, wage structures and access to credit and digital tools are not “soft” add-ons. They are design parameters that will decide whether millions of women move into higher-value roles- as technicians, supervisors, entrepreneurs- or remain stuck in low-value segments of green value chains.
If a green job does not work for women and informal workers in terms of safety, income stability and voice, then our transition is only partially green.
Governance as design: who carries the risk?
CEEW’s work also underlines that India’s green transition is not just a technological challenge; it is a question of governance and ecosystem design. The report identifies recurring bottlenecks: high capital costs in early-stage sectors; weak raw and recycled material supply chains; limited R&D; skill gaps; and missing standards and certification for emerging technologies. These issues shape who can participate, on what terms and at what level of risk.
It calls for a “whole-of-government” approach, underscoring that no single ministry can mainstream the green economy on its own, and a “whole-of-economy” approach that works with actors from multinational corporations and large industries to farmer producer organisations, cooperatives, SMEs and self-help groups. It also emphasises that a people-centric green economy will ensure widespread participation and ownership, enabling over a billion individuals to drive India’s journey towards becoming economically thriving, socially responsible and environmentally resilient.
From “who designs” to “who designs, how and with whom”
The usual question- who designs and who decides the future of work in the green economy- is necessary but not sufficient. We must also ask: how are decisions made, with whom are they made, and who ultimately bears the risk when things go wrong?
Three practical tensions are worth keeping in view:
- Capital vs control: When impact capital flows into green sectors, who sets the definition of success? Are we counting only the number of green jobs, or also the quality and stability of livelihoods?
- Innovation versus inclusion: When new technologies or business models are deployed, whose problems are being solved first- the problems of investors and consumers, or those of workers and communities on the frontline of climate risk?
- Speed versus voice: As India rightly races to scale green solutions, whose voices get left out because meaningful consultation seems too slow?
These are not arguments for delay. They are arguments for better design discipline. The recently announced Labour Codes provide a vital framework for this new opportunity. Treating livelihoods- especially those of women and frontline informal workers- not as a downstream impact metric but as a design input at the very beginning of policy and investment decisions is fully compatible with India’s ambition to lead global climate action.
A design discipline for Green Viksit Bharat
What might this discipline look like in practice, in a way that supports and amplifies ongoing government efforts?
Build design on better data. Current labour surveys still group emerging sectors under broad categories like “power generation including solar”, making it hard to track women’s participation and job quality across specific green value chains. Disaggregated, gender-sensitive data will help central and state governments, as well as investors, target support where it is most needed.
Embed inclusion in public capital. Measures such as reserving a share of public procurement for women-led MSMEs point in the right direction. The next step is to ensure that concessional finance and guarantees for green sectors routinely ask: how are women and informal workers participating in higher-value segments of this value chain?
Spotlight on decentralised and rural opportunities. With over half of MSMEs located in rural areas and decentralised renewables already powering small manufacturing, there is a natural base to build on. Designing schemes that link these enterprises into green value chains- as suppliers, service providers and innovators- can spread both jobs and resilience beyond metropolitan clusters.
None of these steps requires a change in national ambition; they simply align design choices more closely with the goals already articulated in the Prime Minister’s speeches on green growth and “Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Vishwas”.
The one extra question
If this discussion were distilled into a single discipline for all of us- governments, investors, philanthropies, enterprises- it would be this:
Before we sign off on the next policy, deal or programme in the green economy, much like Gandhi’s talisman, we ask one extra question in the room: “If a woman worker or a frontline informal worker were sitting at this table, what would she ask us to change in this design- and who is carrying the risk?”
If that question becomes routine- in state secretariats and municipal councils, in impact investing committees and CSR boards, in start-up accelerators and large-company strategy off-sites – then India’s green transition will not only be faster and fairer. It will also be more resilient and aligned with the spirit of Green Viksit Bharat: a future that is low-carbon, dignified, inclusive and shared.
*Samar Verma is a senior economist, public policy professional and an institution-builder, with 28 years of experience in economic policy research, international development, grant management and philanthropic leadership. The views expressed are personal.
