We the Italians November 16, 2015 - 72 | Page 24

th # 72 •novemBER 16 , 2015 and innovation, between 2013 and 2014 sales increased in 19.6% of the companies investing in green, against the 13.4% of the others. Percentages than in manufacturing rise to 27.4% against 19.9%. Sustainability is an important driver also in creating jobs, either among eco-investing companies and among. The 14.9% of recruitments in 2015 (74,700 jobs) relates to green jobs, threshold in- 24 | WE THE ITALIANS www.wetheitalians.com creased by 4 percentage points over 2009. In the corporate design and research and development green jobs become the real protagonists of innovation, reaching 67%. an impressive 294,200 “green” workers, the 59% of the demand for labor. Even our small and medium-sized companies bring their important contribution and excel at European level in terms of “green conversion” employment: from the end of 2014, 51% of Italian SMEs have at least one green jobs, more than in the UK (37%), France (32%) and Germany (29%). If we go over the fence of strictly green jobs and we also look to the demand for professionals with simply green expertise, we see that the hirings with these requirements are 219,500. Overall, adding the two figures we reach Leaders in energy and