Opening Statement to the Committee on the Environment and Sustainable Development
1998 Report of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development
Brian Emmett, Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development
Mr. Chairman:
It is a pleasure to be here to discuss my second report to Parliament, which was tabled earlier today. With me are my colleagues Ellen Shillabeer and Richard Smith. After some brief introductory remarks, we will be pleased to answer any questions you may have.
Last year at this time, I reported that with respect to the issues concerning the environment and sustainable development, the government too frequently makes promises it does not keep; the government has trouble meeting the challenges of managing the environment and sustainable development; and information made available to Parliament and to Canadians is either insufficient or excessively difficult to use.
The report tabled today contains more evidence on these points and reaches a similar conclusion: the federal government urgently needs to apply the principles of good management to problems of the environment and sustainable development.
If performance does not improve, there will be direct consequences for Canadians: the environment and our health will be threatened, the capacity of the federal government to act will erode, and the government’s capacity and moral authority to lead will diminish.
Let me summarize our finding in the three broad areas that we judge to be of critical importance.
Sustainable development strategies require departments to consider the impacts of all their activities -- operations and policy decisions -- on the environment and sustainable development. This is a tool that is new and unique to Canada.
How well did departments do?
The response by departments was positive and encouraging. Many people put time, energy and effort into their sustainable development strategies and departments did most of the things suggested in the Guide to Green Government.
But departments failed to establish measurable targets. And without measurable targets progress cannot be assessed by Parliament and by Canadians. This is a serious problem. We have recommended that departments present targets to the House in the spring of 1999.
Beyond this, strategies tend to focus on today’s issues rather than tomorrow’s issues. Our report, presents the trends that world leaders discussed on the fifth anniversary of the Earth Summit last year. These trends, such as increases in population, in pollution, and in resource use have important implications for our environment. But strategies did not “look over the horizon” to determine what new activities are needed to cope with these challenges. I would like to see the strategies become more challenging, more imaginative and more change-oriented.
In the fall of next year, we plan to publish a paper containing our expectations for the next strategies, which are due in the year 2000.
Federal activities take place within the global context, and this brings me to my next point.
For several reasons, Canadians have a keen interest in environmental protection and in the potential impacts of global environmental deterioration. We are the stewards of a very large country with the world’s longest coastline. We are particularly vulnerable to the effects of actions by our neighbours. And with a reputation for leadership in international affairs, we are also in a good position to influence the global environmental agenda through our ideas and our actions. This will be particularly important in the 21st century as global problems proliferate and become more complicated.
We set out to identify our global commitments and to see if Canada is meeting our obligations. We discovered that there was no system for cataloguing these agreements, or for determining whether Canada is in compliance. We therefore developed a data base of international agreements that in the future will be managed by the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.
While Canada is party to 230 different agreements, we focussed our detailed examinations of Canada’s performance on two -- climate change and biodiversity, both the subject of conventions signed at the Earth Summit in 1992.
Climate change in particular is a daunting problem. In Canada our goal is to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000. Strategic direction on climate change has been provided by the National Action Program on Climate Change (NAPCC). This is a federal provincial and territorial initiative.
However, by the year 2000, emissions are expected to be at least 11 percent above 1990 levels. We wanted to understand why, to identify lessons to be learned from this experience.
Canada’s record is similar to the performance of most other developed economies. Nevertheless, as you know, it puts us in a difficult position to begin to work toward the much tougher goal agreed to by the government at Kyoto in 1997.
Our work shows that the federal government has not applied sound, basic management principles to the implementation of its policy commitment.
For example, we found no unambiguous written description of the roles, responsibilities and contributions of those involved. The federal government’s own role is complicated by the absence of a federal lead on this issue. There was no overall plan for implementation that set milestones and interim targets to guide the efforts of the partners. There was limited results-based monitoring and no summary level reporting to Parliament to assist it in its oversight role.
A new management regime is required, with roles and responsibilities clearly defined, agreed and recorded; a comprehensive implementation plan with interim targets and deadlines; a monitoring process; a process for making adjustments as needed; and the regular provision of high-quality information and analyses to Parliament.
In 1992, Canada also signed the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity. Biodiversity refers to the complex variety of life on earth and the need to preserve it as a source of new medicines, crops, or simple enjoyment of nature. Today, many plants, birds, animals and other forms of life are being threatened by increased pollution and the destruction of habitat worldwide.
Canadian implementation of the Convention has been slow. Only two of eight federal implementation plans have been completed to date. And again we find they do not contain deadlines, resource information, expected results or performance indicators. Since biodiversity requires much the same co-operative approach as climate change, a lack of attention to these basic elements may well lead to management difficulties and a failure to implement.
Once again, this reinforces a central theme of my second report -- if we are to keep our environmental promises we need to take action and take it now.
We need to make sure that the action we take is the right action, and likely to achieve our objectives. To do this, we need good tools to make good decisions.
Because of its importance to good decisions on the environment, we looked at environmental impact assessment. Large scale environmental assessments overseen by panels are rare – around ten per year. Therefore we focused on the bulk of the activity under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act – the 5000 screenings carried out by the federal government under the Act each year.
First, we found problems with their scope. Screenings may not consider all of the environmental impacts of a project. Second, monitoring is a problem. We found that it is not possible to say, for example, whether the assessment process actually reduces harmful effects on the environment.
We found that the federal index, designed to make information available to interested Canadians, is incomplete and difficult to use. Furthermore, most of the screening reports that are intended to show the work done on an assessment were not completed, nor were they included in the Index.
Finally, we also noted that although a 1990 Cabinet directive requires the environmental assessment process to be applied to policy decisions, progress has been slow.
We also found some good environmental assessment practices. These give us confidence that problems can be fixed and that environmental assessment remains an important instrument for making better environmental decisions.
Our report looks at three other areas where we are working to build better tools. In A Strategic Approach to Environmental Management, we present the results of a review of the practices of some leading corporations like Nortel, TransAlta, and Volvo.
We found that effective sustainable development strategies in the public or the private sector have much in common with good strategic planning in general. They involve commitment from the top, education and awareness throughout the organization, clear goals and measurable targets. The key elements are very straightforward, and the results are surprisingly effective.
Good information can lead to environmental gains, or cost reductions, or both. This is why we are committed to working with government departments to develop ways of accounting for sustainable development. Our chapter Counting the Environment In reports on work with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada to develop new ways of using both financial and other information that can help managers make better decisions.
What gets measured gets done. Therefore performance indicators are critical to better operational and policy decisions. In our chapter Performance Measurement for Sustainable Development Strategies, we set out the characteristics of a good performance indicator. We hope that this will help departments measure more and ultimately help them manage better and do more.
Next year we will look at Canada’s management of toxic substances; international agreements that affect the Arctic; and harmonization; among other issues. As well, we hope to continue to work with departments on projects such as accounting for sustainable development.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank the Committee for its ongoing interest and support. The work of the Committee is vital to Canada’s success in meeting its environmental goals. I look forward to a continuing productive relationship.
We will be pleased to answer any questions you might have.