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Digital Platforms, Green Services and New Informal Work: Opportunity or Trap?

Sushanta Kumar Mahapatra & Madan Meher

Economic and Political Weekly2026https://doi.org/10.71279/epw.v61i8.47128article
ABDC B
Weight
0.50

Abstract

India’s low-carbon transition is driving the emergence of new forms of “green” work, including solar installation, energy-efficiency retrofits, recycling, and circular-economy services, many of which are now facilitated by digital platforms. These platforms promise efficiency, transparency, and scalable service delivery; yet, emerging research shows that they rarely transform the structural precarity faced by informal workers. Evidence from waste systems, renewable-energy labour markets and platform-work studies indicates that while platforms can improve visibility, price discovery and access to formal contracts, they often reproduce existing hierarchies, fragmented employment relations and exclusionary onboarding requirements. As India’s platform workforce expands rapidly, policy design becomes crucial. Embedding labour standards in procurement, linking skilling to guaranteed placements, enabling portable social protection and strengthening worker collectives can shift platformisation from merely digitising informality to supporting a just green transition. Effective governance, not technology alone, will determine whether green platform work becomes an opportunity or a trap.

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https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.71279/epw.v61i8.47128

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@article{sushanta2026,
  title        = {{Digital Platforms, Green Services and New Informal Work: Opportunity or Trap?}},
  author       = {Sushanta Kumar Mahapatra & Madan Meher},
  journal      = {Economic and Political Weekly},
  year         = {2026},
  doi          = {https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.71279/epw.v61i8.47128},
}

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Digital Platforms, Green Services and New Informal Work: Opportunity or Trap?

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Evidence weight

0.50

Balanced mode · F 0.40 / M 0.15 / V 0.05 / R 0.40

F · citation impact0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20
M · momentum0.50 × 0.15 = 0.07
V · venue signal0.50 × 0.05 = 0.03
R · text relevance †0.50 × 0.4 = 0.20

† Text relevance is estimated at 0.50 on the detail page — for your query’s actual relevance score, open this paper from a search result.