Green Strings: Principles and conditions for a green recovery from COVID-19 in Canada

The document argues that Canada's COVID-19 recovery spending must be deliberately steered toward climate goals through specific conditions on bailouts and stimulus. It outlines seven 'green strings' to ensure a sustainable recovery: requiring zero-emission transition conditions for industry support, applying strict financial conditions like climate risk disclosure, prioritizing a worker-focused just transition, supporting low-carbon infrastructure, maintaining environmental regulations, ensuring spending transparency, and promoting social equity.

• The authors argue that the Canadian government has a right and duty to steer recovery outcomes given the scale of spending, noting that green recovery measures are proven to drive economic growth and job creation.
• To avoid locking the economy into unsustainable paths, financial support for industry must be conditioned on a transition to zero emissions, aligning with the target of net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
• The document recommends strict financial conditions for recovery funds, specifically prohibiting shareholder dividend payouts and stock buybacks, while requiring climate risk disclosure to improve financial stability.
• Recovery efforts should prioritize a 'just transition' for workers, particularly those moving from high-carbon sectors, and ensure that support for new infrastructure provides tangible social and economic benefits to communities.
• The proposed framework emphasizes that Canada must not backtrack on existing environmental commitments and should ensure that federal spending details are publicly available and enforced.

APA

Corkal, V., Gass, P., & Cosbey, A. (2020). Green Strings: Principles and conditions for a green recovery from COVID-19 in Canada. International Institute for Sustainable Development. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2020-07/green-strings-covid-19-canada-summary-en.pdf

Chicago

Corkal, Vanessa, Philip Gass, and Aaron Cosbey. Green Strings: Principles and conditions for a green recovery from COVID-19 in Canada. International Institute for Sustainable Development, 2020. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2020-07/green-strings-covid-19-canada-summary-en.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Corkal |first1=Vanessa |last2=Gass |first2=Philip |last3=Cosbey |first3=Aaron |title=Green Strings: Principles and conditions for a green recovery from COVID-19 in Canada |publisher=International Institute for Sustainable Development |date=2020 |url=https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2020-07/green-strings-covid-19-canada-summary-en.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{corkal2020green, author = {Corkal, Vanessa and Gass, Philip and Cosbey, Aaron}, title = {{Green Strings: Principles and conditions for a green recovery from COVID-19 in Canada}}, institution = {International Institute for Sustainable Development}, year = {2020}, url = {https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2020-07/green-strings-covid-19-canada-summary-en.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }