The Green Economy Pocketbook

The Green Economy Pocketbook advocates for a systemic shift toward a green economy to combat economic instability and environmental decline. It proposes redefining progress through wellbeing indicators, redirecting financial flows via green public procurement and the removal of subsidies, and investing in high-impact sectors like renewable energy and sustainable agriculture. The guide emphasizes a just transition through education and skills training to reduce poverty and inequality, while warning that current resource-intensive growth is unsustainable. It also highlights the growth of Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) and proposes nine guiding principles for a fair and inclusive green economy.

• Achieving a green economy requires redefining 'progress' by replacing or supplementing GDP growth with indicators that incorporate human wellbeing and environmental health to address both material and environmental poverty.
• Governments can drive the transition by influencing financial flows through greening public procurement (which represents 13-17% of GDP), ending subsidies for energy, transport, and industry, and incentivizing business innovation.
• The document identifies the need to green high-impact sectors—specifically renewable energy, sustainable agriculture, and public transport—and notes that Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) were valued at US$77 billion annually in 2007, with a projection of US$300 billion by 2020.

APA

Green Economy Coalition (2012). The Green Economy Pocketbook. https://www.greeneconomycoalition.org/news-and-resources/the-green-economy-pocketbook

Chicago

Green Economy Coalition. The Green Economy Pocketbook. 2012. https://www.greeneconomycoalition.org/news-and-resources/the-green-economy-pocketbook.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Green Economy Coalition |title=The Green Economy Pocketbook |date=2 June 2012 |url=https://www.greeneconomycoalition.org/news-and-resources/the-green-economy-pocketbook |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{greeneconomycoalition2012green, author = {{Green Economy Coalition}}, title = {{The Green Economy Pocketbook}}, institution = {Green Economy Coalition}, year = {2012}, month = jun, url = {https://www.greeneconomycoalition.org/news-and-resources/the-green-economy-pocketbook}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }