Over the past decade or so, a number of organizations have taken up the challenge of developing a sustainability index or similar tool, a figure that changes over time as countries and communities become more or less sustainable. However, as there is still no consensus on the indicators that should be incorporated in an all-encompassing sustainability index, this field of work remains somewhat controversial.

Sustainability indexes currently available or under development include:

UNDP Human Development Report
Launched in 1990, the Human Development Report aims to "put people at the center of the development process" in terms of economic debate, policy and advocacy, going beyond income to assess the level of people’s long-term well-being.

Environmental Sustainability Index
Canada ranks third out of 122 countries, evaluated in an exercise designed to create a series of comparative benchmarks of environmental conditions in different countries and shift environmental decision-making on to a fact-based analytically rigorous foundation.

Canada vs. the OECD – An Environmental Comparison
This University of Victoria study compares Canada’s environmental record to the other industrialized nations in the OECD but does not attempt to include the social and  economic data necessary for a sustainability index.

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