Making just transitions work - lessons for business leaders

The greatest economic shift of our age - the decarbonisation of the global economy - is well underway and already shaping business access to capital, workforce availability, policy alignment, and long-term competitiveness.

One of the biggest challenges businesses face in implementing a just transition is the lack of real-world examples to guide them.

This report aims to fill that gap with lessons from four in-depth cases of real-time just transitions in action across diverse contexts and sectors, to help businesses identify:

• the opportunity just transitions present to enter new high-growth markets;
• the investor and regulatory confidence that flows from meaningful engagement with affected communities - and the subsequent social licence for business operations;
• the business risk mitigation that comes from embedding climate and social resilience into operations and supply chains;
• and the transformational potential of decarbonisation for innovating entirely new people- and planet-aligned structures and systems

The cases explored - spanning agroforestry, renewable-powered value chains, community-led housing, and post-coal local economic diversification - and the people at their centre, show that just transitions are are a catalyst for growth, innovation, and long-term competitiveness.

The report builds on IHRB's JUST Stories project, which shares stories of people working together to advance just transitions. Read our deep-dive multimedia features and find out more about the stories and perspectives of the people involved in these net zero transitions.