Just Transition in Upper Silesia – WWF report available!
February 2 2021
'Guidelines for the Upper Silesian Territorial Just Transition Plan' is the newest research report prepared for WWF by IBS experts.
The aim of the report ‘Guidelines for the Upper Silesian Territorial Just Transition Plan’ was to assess the consequences of decarbonization for the regional labour market, point out the alternative professional activities with the potential to replace mining jobs and provide the review of transitional instruments such as safety nets and the policy guidelines for managing this process.
Main Conclusions
- employment reduction should be the highest in the present decade;
- construction, manufacturing and energy sector have the highest potential to replace mining jobs;
- regional government should be a leading institution coordinating mining transformation process.
Key facts:
- It is possible to create 75.000-85.000 new jobs in Silesia until 2030.
- Construction, manufacturing and energy sectors have the highest potential to replace mining jobs.
- Up to 13,000 current mining workers could prematurely leave the sector in Upper Silesia Basin in the next 10 years.
- We estimate the indirect-to-direct job ratio as 1.2-1.4 mainly in the sectors of the machinery industry, energy and transport.
- Assuming job numbers shrink in mining and mining-related industries and using the lowest estimates of new jobs created in the activities mentioned above, there could be a net increase in job numbers by 2030, of around 34,000.
The full report is available here (Polish only).
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We gratefully thank Piotr Lewandowski, Jan Rutkowski and Marek Antosiewicz for their insightful comments. The report was prepared within the project “Regions and Municipalities for a Just Transition” as a part of the European Climate Initiative (EUKI). EUKI is a project financing instrument by the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU). It is the overarching goal of the EUKI to foster climate cooperation within the European Union (EU) in order to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. The opinions expressed in this report are the sole responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of either the BMU or IBS. The report was prepared for the Foundation WWF Poland and belonged to this organisation. © Foundation WWF Poland.
