COP 31 Panel Proposes Workforce Metric for Next Global Stocktake

Climate plans are colliding with a shortage of trained workers, and a pair of COP 31 side-event panels on Nov. 14, 2026, argued that skills now belong at the center of national climate strategy. Speakers proposed adding a workforce-readiness metric to the next global stocktake, and employer federations pitched themselves as the delivery channel. No formal decisions were taken. The sessions still signaled a shift: workforce readiness is increasingly framed as a constraint on climate delivery, not a side issue.

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• Workforce-readiness metric proposed for the next global stocktake of climate progress
• Under 0.5% of climate finance goes to skills, despite 375 million potential jobs
• 81% of new national climate plans now reference skills, NDC Partnership reported
• Employer federations offer a "safe space" for sharing sensitive hiring-demand data
• Small and midsize firms provide about 70% of jobs, putting them at the center of skills planning

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Skills Gap Emerges as Climate Delivery Bottleneck

The first panel, "Delivering on Jobs and Skills for the New Economy," made a blunt case: countries cannot electrify their economies without the workers to build and maintain the systems. Representatives from Schneider Electric, NDC Partnership, Student Energy and LinkedIn framed skills shortages as a bottleneck for electrification.

The basics: Nationally determined contributions, or NDCs, are the climate plans each country submits under the Paris Agreement. "NDCs 3.0" refers to the latest round. The global stocktake is the Paris Agreement's periodic review of collective progress.

Why it matters: Panelists cited 375 million potential jobs in the transition, yet less than 0.5% of climate finance is going to skills. Putting a workforce metric in the stocktake could pull skills into formal progress reviews, and could pull finance toward them.

Where things stand: Skills are already on governments' radar. NDC Partnership reported that 81% of NDCs 3.0 reference skills. The gap is between mentioning skills and planning, funding and delivering training.

The labor market data points the same way. Citing a 53% figure, a LinkedIn representative said, "That's the labor market advantage for workers with green skills globally." Speakers also said demand for green skills is growing twice as fast as supply.

What works on the ground: Student Energy brought program-level findings. Its research found that employer co-creation, meaning businesses helping design training, predicts whether a program succeeds. For young people, the first barrier was simply awareness that these jobs exist.

That finding cuts against a common assumption that training capacity alone is the problem. If young people don't know the jobs exist, new programs may go underused.

Decisions and stakeholder impacts: The panel was informational, with no motions or votes. The proposals carry different stakes for each group:

• Young workers stand to gain from better outreach and employer-designed programs.
• Training providers and governments face pressure to tie skills to NDC targets.
• Climate finance institutions are the implicit target of the 0.5% critique.
• Employers in electrification gain the most if supply catches up with demand.

What's next: Speakers called for a workforce-readiness metric in the next global stocktake. They also urged better planning, flexible training delivery and dedicated finance for green skills. No timeline or sponsoring body was identified.

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Federations Pitch Themselves as Skills Middlemen

The second panel, a compact on business federations' role in skills delivery, made a structural argument. Industry associations and chambers can see across hundreds of firms in a way governments and individual companies cannot.

Why it matters: Small and midsize enterprises provide about 70% of employment, panelists noted. National skills plans that reach only large corporations will miss most of the workforce.

Where things stand: Speakers walked through existing models:

• CII, represented by its deputy executive director, described value-chain reporting and a green skill council in India.
• Argentina's Ruta Verde program was cited as a federation-led skills effort.
• Türkiye's training center was offered as a scalable delivery model.
• Fiji's resilience toolkit, linked to the Fiji Commerce and Employers Federation, served as a small-economy example.

The International Organisation of Employers and a co-chair of SB COP Working Group 5 joined the federation case. Federations argued they can aggregate employer demand signals, support smaller firms and scale pilot programs.

The other side: The hardest question was data. Employers' hiring forecasts are commercially sensitive, and firms don't want competitors seeing them. Panelists discussed safeguards for sharing that information. They pitched federations as a trusted intermediary that can pool demand data without exposing individual companies.

That tension matters. Student Energy's finding that employer co-creation predicts success only works if employers share what they need. Federations are offering to solve that trust problem.

Decisions and stakeholder impacts: No formal action was taken. In closing, an SB COP representative described a shift in the group's agenda: "Today our number one priority is green jobs and skills."

• Small businesses could gain access to training they can't build alone.
• Chambers and federations gain a larger institutional role in climate delivery.
• Governments gain a channel to reach many firms at once.

What's next: The panel closed with a call to scale chamber-led examples. Because chambers reach large numbers of firms, they offer a ready delivery channel for skills programs. No specific commitments, funding or dates were announced.

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Looking Ahead

Both panels pointed toward the next global stocktake as the venue where workforce readiness could become a measured part of climate progress. Watch whether the workforce-metric proposal gains formal sponsors, and whether climate finance moves beyond the under-0.5% share now going to skills.