The lofty goals of Agenda 21 called for an equally high infusion of financial resources, along with better mechanisms for delivering these investments. But the Government of Canada's singling out of IDRC, with its expertise and experience, recognized that successful implementation also turned on people and their empowerment. The Rio Declaration, which placed people "at the centre of concerns for sustainable development" echoes one of the Centre's founding principles, namely that for societies to build their own futures, they must make their own decisions about development. And to make these decisions, people need the right tools and resources.

For more than 30 years, IDRC has strived to equip people in the South with tools for change. In building a world based on the twin principles of sustainable and equitable development, the tools include technologies, new sources of information, and ways to build capacity. Agenda 21 cited these among the key prerequisites for meeting sustainable development goals and they figure as critical elements of IDRC's research program, as shown by the following projects. The projects — all current initiatives — also underscore how IDRC has worked to transform Agenda 21's blueprint for the future into action and achievement in the present.

Waste Not, Want Not

"New and efficient technologies will be essential to ... achieve sustainable development, sustain the world's economy, protect the environment, and alleviate poverty and human suffering." Agenda 21: Chapter 34. Transfer of Environmentally-sound Technology, Cooperation, and Capacity-building (1992)

"IDRC will support R and D into technology development, to help create clean alternatives to current environmentally degrading technologies." Meeting the Global Challenge: Themes and Programs of the International Development Research Centre (1993)

"IDRC will foster and support the production, dissemination, and application of research results leading to policies and technologies that enhance the lives of people in developing countries." Corporate Strategy and Program Framework, 2000–2005 (2000)

A typhoid epidemic hit Dakar, Senegal, in 1987, causing serious illness among 400 residents. A later study showed that those afflicted had eaten vegetables contaminated by "dirty water."

With shortages of fresh water in Dakar, urban gardeners have increasingly been irrigating their plots with insufficiently treated or raw wastewater. To eliminate the public health hazards of this practice, an IDRC-supported project is using aquatic plants to treat wastewater. Water lettuce improves the treatment process in several ways, such as filtering out solids and limiting algae growth. The water can then be reused in market gardens. In Castor, a neighbourhood on the outskirts of Dakar, community members involved in the project are growing a cornucopia of fruit and vegetables — from hot peppers and papayas to okra and onions. Not only do the gardens provide a source of food, they also generate income for the growers who sell the produce.

This project is one of several that are exploring the use of simple technologies to treat household wastewater in urban areas. Research in the West Bank in Jordan has looked at the purifying effects of duckweed, while another project is improving the design of a small-scale filters for "graywater" — the water from sinks, showers, and laundry tubs. Through water reuse, farming in the city can produce affordable, nutritious, and safe food for the urban poor.

Coastal Clean-up

"One role of the sciences should be to provide information to better enable formulation and selection of environment and development policies in the decision-making process." Agenda 21: Chapter 35. Science for Sustainable Development (1992)

"IDRC is funding research ... on improving the existing body of knowledge available to developing countries on subjects related to policymaking." Meeting the Global Challenge: Themes and Programs of the International Development Research Centre (1993)

"IDRC is pledged to the generation and use of knowledge in ways that alleviate poverty and improve people's lives." Corporate Strategy and Program Framework, 2000–2005 (2000)

On 26 July 1832, the HMS Beagle dropped anchor in the estuary of the Rio de la Plata in Uruguay. On board was Charles Darwin, who wrote of being "surrounded by numerous seals and penguins" and a sea luminous with phosphorescence. Today, the scene in the 300 kilometre wide estuary — the largest in South America — is much different. With most of Uruguay's 3.3 million people living within 100 kilometres of the coast, the estuary suffers from a host of environmental problems. Human activity is contributing to pollution, erosion, and sedimentation. Both small-scale fishers and inshore industrial ships have seen their fish harvests drop. Not surprisingly, the deteriorating ecosystem is affecting both the local population and the tourism industry.

Researchers from Uruguay and Canada, however, are pointing to ways to manage the estuary and conserve its valuable resources. The researchers make up a "virtual institution" working on an initiative known as EcoPlata, launched by IDRC in 1994. Through collaborative research, EcoPlata has generated a wealth of data on many aspects of the Rio de la Plata system and initiated several pilot projects. The work is directed at developing sound management practices for the coastal zone that involve government institutions, the scientific community, and the public. An important step toward this goal was taken in May 2001 with the creation of a special commission by the Uruguayan government to address problems in the Rio de la Plata coastal area. EcoPlata serves as the commission's technical secretariat.

Environmental Economics in Asia

"A fundamental goal of capacity-building is to enhance the ability to evaluate and address the critical questions related to policy choices and modes of implementation among development options, based on an understanding of environmental potentials and limits and of needs as perceived by the people ...." Agenda 21: Chapter 37. National Mechanisms and International Cooperation for Capacity-building in Developing Countries (1992)

"IDRC will support research and training programs to investigate the relationship between the environment and the economy." Meeting the Global Challenge: Themes and Programs of the International Development Research Centre (1993)

"To reduce the high social and economic costs of widespread environmental damage, IDRC will support research geared to developing economic and other tools for improving environmental management and health." Corporate Strategy and Program Framework, 2000–2005 (2000)

"We went into the conference thinking it was about the environment. We came out realizing it was about economics." So concluded Maurice Strong at the end of the Earth Summit, which he headed as its Secretary-General. His remark later found practical expression in the creation of the Economy and Environment Program for Southeast Asia (EEPSEA) by IDRC in 1993. EEPSEA supports training and research in environmental and resource economics in 10 Asian countries. Its goal is to strengthen local capacity for the economic analysis of environmental problems so that researchers can provide sound advice to policymakers. In the Philippines, for example, this has meant that research on households' willingness to pay for water and on the industrial use of groundwater contributed to changes in water policy in Manila. At a regional level, environment ministers of member countries in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) adopted a land-clearing policy that aimed to reduce forest burning. This came after an EEPSEA study showed almost US $4.5 billion in damages from fires and haze in Indonesia in 1997.

EEPSEA also ushered in a new way of "doing business" at IDRC. It was the Centre's first Secretariat, a mechanism that pools funding from several donors in a collective effort to support research.

Statistics of Sustainability

"Commonly used indicators such as gross national product and measurements of individual resources or pollution flows do not provide adequate indications of sustainability." Agenda 21: Chapter 40. Information for Decision-making (1992)

"The Centre will develop indicators for sustainable and equitable development." Meeting the Global Challenge: Themes and Programs of the International Development Research Centre (1993)

"[Factors have] lead to fundamental changes in the relationship between people and resources – changes that need to be understood and managed." Corporate Strategy and Program Framework, 2000–2005 (2000)

Gross domestic product. Debt-servicing ratio. Balance of payments. A country's progress, or lack thereof, is usually defined by these terms. Yet they fail to take into account how nations deal with human and environmental health — both essential elements of development.

This is the aim of the Wellbeing Assessment, a unique method of measuring human and ecosystem wellbeing developed with the support of IDRC and the World Conservation Union. The new tool gives equal weight to people and the environment through calculations based on a range of indicators. These include health, knowledge, freedom, equity, and security, as well as land, air, water, and plant diversity. Together, they present a more complete picture of "the state of the nation" than economic statistics. The Wellbeing Assessment also enables individual communities to conduct their own evaluation of their population and environment and to improve conditions without further destroying the ecosystem.

The contributions of several researchers over the last decade were key to the development of the methodology and its testing in Canada and countries in the South. Robert Prescott-Allen, a consultant on sustainable development based in Victoria, Canada, was the principal developer of the Wellbeing Assessment. The results of his survey of 180 countries are presented in The Wellbeing of Nations, copublished this year by IDRC and Island Press. "No country knows how to be green without going into the red," says Prescott-Allen on the difficulties of achieving a balance between human and environmental concerns. "Nations with a high standard of living impose excessive strains on the environment and the ones with low demands on the ecosystem are trapped in poverty.

Joint Ventures

IDRC believes that one of the most effective ways to achieve change is through collaboration. Research networks, by definition collaborative ventures, have long been a hallmark of the Centre's approach to development. But following UNCED, IDRC established a new mechanism for joint action — the international secretariat. Secretariats are multidonor research consortia that provide the financial and administrative infrastructure needed to undertake a long-term research agenda on one particular issue. While they are housed at IDRC, secretariats each have independent steering committees that guide their operations and research directions.

IDRC, in partnership with other donors, has helped create several secretariats to respond to challenges outlined in Agenda 21. The Bellanet International Secretariat grew out of a renewed commitment at the Earth Summit to collaborative approaches to development and a growing awareness of the potential of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to improve international cooperation. Since its inception in 1995, Bellanet has been actively pursuing its mission of helping the international development community to work together more effectively, particularly through the use of ICTs. Bellanet delivers a range of services to enhance collaboration among its partners, including training, developing tools to make it easier to share information, and promoting organizational learning. Through such support, Bellanet aims to help reduce duplication of donor efforts and increase the impact of development investments.

Bellanet is one of six secretariats currently hosted by IDRC.

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