Green Human Capital and Sustainable Healthcare: Evidence from Romania (2014–2024)
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| Pages: | 120 : 131 |
| Abstract: | This paper examines green human capital as a determinant of sustainable healthcare in Romania during 2014-2024. Green human capital is understood as the combination of professional, digital and sustainability-related competencies that enables health workers and organisations to provide effective care while improving resilience and reducing environmental pressures. The study integrates health-economics and labour-market perspectives and uses secondary evidence from Eurostat, OECD, the European Commission and the World Health Organization. A descriptive and comparative design is employed to assess workforce capacity, health financing, professional development, digital readiness and the emerging role of green skills. The evidence indicates substantial quantitative progress in physician density, but persistent shortages, territorial imbalances, migration pressures and comparatively low health expenditure continue to constrain system performance. In 2021 Romania recorded 3.5 practising doctors and 8.0 nurses per 1,000 population, compared with EU averages of 4.1 and 8.5. In 2023 health expenditure represented 5.8% of GDP, compared with 10.0% in the EU. These gaps suggest that workforce expansion alone is insufficient. Sustainable healthcare requires continuous professional development, digital capabilities and explicit climate-health competencies embedded in education, organisational practice and workforce planning. The paper concludes that green human capital should be treated as a strategic health-system investment connecting workforce resilience, efficiency, digital transformation and environmental sustainability. |
| JEL classification: | I11, I15, I18, J24, Q56 |
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I11, I15, I18, J24, Q56
