Jobs in a Changing Climate - Insights from World Bank Group Country Climate and Development Reports - Fourth Summary Report

Jul 19, 2026

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Jobs in a Changing Climate synthesizes insights from the World Bank Group’s Country Climate and Development Reports (CCDRs) across 93 economies. It explains how climate impacts threaten development prospects and job opportunities, while climate policies can support a workforce that adapts. The report quantifies adaptation and low-emission benefits for GDP, poverty reduction, and jobs, highlighting investment needs, policy changes, and finance mechanisms to accelerate resilient, inclusive outcomes.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages2

Reading Time5 min

AccessFree to download

Overview: Jobs in a Changing Climate

Climate change risks and job impacts

Adaptation and low-emission benefits for jobs and incomes

Investment, policy, and financing requirements

Jobs in a Changing Climate Insights from World Bank Group Country Climate and Development Reports covering 93 economies Public Disc losure Authorized Pub lic Disc losure Authorized The World Bank’s Country Climate and Development Reports (CCDRs) provide a crosscutting look at how countries’ development prospects—and the job opportunities they offer to their people—can be threatened by climate impacts and supported by climate policies. Each CCDR starts from the country’s development priorities, opportunities, and challenges, and is developed in close consultation with governments, businesses, and civil society, ensuring the recommendations reflect national priorities. Published CCDRs cover 93 economies, representing 64 percent of the population and 77 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) of low- and middle-income countries (LICs and MICs) . CCDRs have been downloaded more than 836,000 times, and discussed in more than 12,500 media articles, including 56 percent explicitly referencing the findings related to jobs. This fourth summary report updates and expands the analyses presented in earlier CCDR summaries and provides a deep dive into the findings related to jobs. Its key findings are the following. Smart, resilient development can reduce risks and unlock short-term economic benefits Investment in adaptation and resilience is an opportunity to accelerate development and poverty reduction. Under current policies, climate change poses a macrocritical threat, with rising and uneven costs: by 2050, countries could face potential GDP losses ranging from 1 to 20 percent, with lower-income and hotter countries experiencing the greatest impacts. While proactive adaptation cannot offset all risks, it delivers high returns, reducing projected GDP losses by an average of 4 percentage points and, in some cases, more than halving climate impacts. Benefits from adaptation interventions recommended in the CCDRs, by 2050 High-income Upper-middle-income Lower-middle-income Low-income | | | | | | | | | | +2.5 | | +0.7 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | | | | | | | | | +3.0 | | | | | | | | | | | +5.0 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | -11 -10 -9 -8 -7 -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 Median percentage change in real GDP compared to 2050 baseline The benefits from low-emission development extend beyond long-term avoided climate change impacts to include tangible short-term economic benefits. By encouraging investments in cleaner and more efficient technologies, low-emission development has neutral or positive impacts on GDP in most, but not all, countries. Nature is a foundational economic asset: global forest loss costs global agricultural GDP $379 billion a year, while nature-based solutions like mangrove restoration yield benefit-cost ratios of 4–5. Resilient low-emission development requires increased investments, from the public and the private sectors. In 80 percent of CCDR countries, annual investments need to increase by between 0.7 and 7.1 percent of GDP, around half of which is expected to come from the private sector. This requires significant policy changes, domestic resource mobilization, public-private partnerships, and new financial instruments—such as guarantees and integrated disaster risk finance and insurance strategies. 1 Overview: Jobs in a Changing Climate Climate and development goals need the same thing: A workforce and jobs that can adjust and adapt to change Climate change impacts and adaptation are expected to have widespread impacts on jobs and livelihoods. Using the proposed World Bank Group scorecard indicator for jobs, CCDRs estimate future climate change impacts equivalent to the loss of 43 million “more and better-paid jobs” in 49 countries by 2050. Adaptation interventions identified in CCDRs are robustly found to reduce these losses, creating or protecting the equivalent of 25 million jobs

FAQs

What do CCDRs say about climate change threats to jobs and livelihoods?

Climate impacts are expected to affect jobs and livelihoods broadly. CCDRs estimate future impacts in terms of losses of “more and better-paid jobs.”

How do adaptation interventions affect job and GDP outcomes by 2050?

Adaptation interventions are expected to reduce projected GDP losses and can create or protect an equivalent number of jobs by 2050 in the same countries where losses are estimated.

What investment and policy changes are needed to achieve resilient low-emission development?

Most CCDR countries need higher annual investments as a share of GDP, with a large portion expected from the private sector. The transition requires policy reforms, domestic resource mobilization, public-private partnerships, and new financial instruments like guarantees and integrated disaster risk finance and insurance strategies.

Jul 19, 2026

Upload by Maeve