Brussels, 13 June 2025 – SkiLMeeT researcher Francesco Vona (Università degli Studi di Milano and Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei) delivered a keynote at the final conference of the Project WeLaR on 12 June in Brussels, offering insights into the labour market effects of the green transition and the political challenges that accompany it.
Drawing on over a decade of research, Vona argued that to fully understand how climate policies reshape work, we need to look at tasks, not just occupations. A job’s “greenness,” he explained, often depends on the specific tasks it involves. Aggregating at the occupational level can lead to significant overestimation of green employment – by as much as a factor of ten.
Vona highlighted that a successful green transition must go beyond innovation: it must also be politically sustainable. Lessons from the China shock remind us that managing labour market disruptions is essential to building public support for structural change. Policies such as retraining, reskilling, and place-based interventions like the EU’s Just Transition Fund are crucial for protecting the communities most exposed to the shift away from fossil fuels.
The discussion following the keynote was moderated by fellow SkiLMeeT researcher Piotr Lewandowski (IBS), who also offered comments on Vona’s findings.
The WeLaR Final Conference, “The effects of digitalisation, globalisation, climate change and demographic shifts on labour markets and welfare states in the European Union”, brought together leading experts to explore the future of work in the era of demographic, digital, and environmental transformations.
