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

The document argues that Canada's post-pandemic reconstruction offers a historic opportunity to pivot toward a low-carbon economy. It outlines seven specific principles, or 'green strings,' to guide bailouts, stimulus, and recovery measures. These include requiring companies to develop net-zero plans, prohibiting stock buybacks and dividends for aid recipients, and ensuring a just transition for workers in high-carbon sectors. The report emphasizes that green stimulus can create as many jobs as neutral measures and calls for increased transparency, equity for Indigenous peoples, and the protection of environmental regulations during the recovery phase.

• Financial support for industry should be contingent on firms developing measurable plans to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, aligned with the Paris Agreement, and reporting progress every five years.
• To ensure financial stability and prioritize workers over shareholders, the government should prohibit corporate stock buybacks, shareholder dividend payouts, and executive bonuses for companies receiving public funds.
• Recovery efforts must prioritize a 'just transition' for workers in high-carbon sectors, including funding for retraining and the implementation of recommendations from the Task Force on Just Transition for Canadian Coal Power Workers and Communities.
• The government should avoid funding industries incompatible with a net-zero trajectory and must not create 'brown infrastructure' that increases capacity for emissions-intensive fossil fuel production.
• Canada should implement mandatory climate risk disclosure for all companies receiving funds, specifically following the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) framework.
• Recovery spending should be used to advance decarbonized energy infrastructure, targeting 90% non-emitting electricity by 2030, and prioritizing clean energy access for remote, Indigenous, and low-income communities.
• To ensure accountability, the government must provide transparent lists of funding recipients and the conditions applied, and consider converting grants to loans or loans to equity if companies fail to meet these conditions.

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-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-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=June 2020 |url=https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2020-07/green-strings-covid-19-canada-en.pdf |access-date=23 October 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}, month = jun, url = {https://www.iisd.org/system/files/2020-07/green-strings-covid-19-canada-en.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }