Sustainability Reporting Program

A report from Michael Keating, Executive Director

THE WEB SITE IS GROWING

If you haven’t visited our site for a while, please click on http://www.sustreport.org/. Then click on the START HERE button to see our revised main page. The work to revised and expand the site has been made possible largely thanks to three recent contracts totalling $28,000.

We want to thank Anne Kerr, Manager of Environment Canada’s Indicators and Assessment Office, Michael Goffin, Director, Great Lakes and Corporate Affairs for Environment Canada’s Ontario Region, and a new SRP supporter, Andy Gilman, Director of Health Canada’s Office of Sustainable Development, for their help in securing this funding, which is essential to keep us operating.

In addition to funding, these supporters of sustainability reporting gave us valuable guidance on priorities and information presentation, including identification of critical sustainability issues to cover and sustainability signals [indicators] to provide data.

As a result of this new funding, our team has been able to develop the Sustainability Issues section. Take a look at the section,

http://www.sustreport.org/issues/intro.html

Under that, check out the three newly developed three sub-sections:

- Climate change [Michael Keating]

- Health and environment [Mary MacDonald]

- Sustainable communities [Kim Peters]

John Chenery created the design, acted as an editor on the project, and put our text and links together to create the web pages.

We at the Sustainability Reporting Program team would welcome your comments and advice on the site.

It is time for us to review how the Sustainability Reporting Program operates. The program was created over the past couple of years as an independent organization operating as a not-for-profit body.

We are receiving signals from funders that it is time to get a more formal status identifying us as a nonprofit organization. This message also came from Arthur Gelgoot of Arthur Gelgoot and Associates, the accounting firm that is providing free accounting services.

It is time for us as to discuss what kind of status would be most appropriate for our program.

There are at least two options.

The first is to incorporate as a not-for-profit Canadian corporation. This would require a lawyer, incorporation fees, a board of directors, accounting services, etc.

The second option I see is affiliation with another organization. As you know, David Bell, Director of the York Centre for Applied Sustainability, is a founding member of the Sustainability Reporting Program. Peter Victor, Dean of the Faculty of Environmental Studies, is a member of our advisory committee. They had suggested an association with York in the past, and raised the possibility again this spring. It is an offer we need to consider seriously.

I would appreciate any comments and suggestions. Keep in mind that we are now operating on a part time basis. Despite the fact we have created Canada’s first online sustainability report, we have had only modest success in raising funds, and this remains the greatest challenge to our future.

We need a structure that allows us editorial freedom to report on what we see as the sustainability issues facing Canada and what we see as progress, opportunities and problems. We also need a way of raising enough money to allow us to operate on a more secure footing.

Finally, I would like to let you know about some reports/web sites:

1. British Columbia has just released a new State of the Environment report. This work is headed by one of our advisors, Risa Smith, Coordinator, State of Environment Reporting, BC Ministry of Environment, Lands and Parks. You can see it at: http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/sppl/soerpt.

2. I am attaching a press release about a joint report on the state of the world’s ecosystems from the United Nations Environment Programme, United Nations Development Programme, World Bank and World Resources Institute. Copies of A Guide to World Resources 2000-2001: People and Ecosystems: The Fraying Web of Life can be downloaded at http://www.wri.org/wri/wrr2000.

3. There is an ongoing global poll on the seriousness of global environment problems, and what should be done. Take a look at Asahi Glass Foundation web site:

Questionnaire on Environmental Problems and the Survival of Humankind

http://www.af-info.or.jp/eng/related/examine/enquete98e/resulte1.html