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Manitoba, Canada

Our Home Province

The International Institute for Sustainable Development is a Canadian-based not-for-profit organization with a team of over 100 staff and associates.

Manitoba has been home to IISD since its inception in 1990. Around 50 staff and associates are resident Manitobans and work from our Winnipeg head office. IISD also has offices in Geneva, New York and Ottawa.

The Province of Manitoba first expressed interest in hosting and helping to fund the institute in 1988, when Canada announced its intention to establish an international institute devoted to advancing sustainable development.

It was a move consistent with Manitoba's historical and ongoing commitment to grounding its economic and social development in a healthy environment. Manitoba was the first Canadian province to establish a multi-stakeholder Round Table on Sustainable Development, the first to pass a Sustainable Development Act and has also taken a leadership role on the issue of climate change.

The famed generosity of Manitobans has played a key role in keeping IISD strong and healthy. Financial support at home is an important signal to potential donors outside of Manitoba and Canada.

The Province of Manitoba continues to provide financial support to IISD and the institute also enjoys the support of many Manitoba businesses, foundations and individuals. This generosity fuels the institute’s innovative spirit. IISD's drive to develop new ideas and systems for sustainable development is the force behind the establishment of the new Water Innovation Centre, in 2009, with a focus on improving the management of Manitoba's iconic Lake Winnipeg.

Aside from simply functioning in Manitoba, IISD maintains active relationships with local post-secondary institutions, does business with many local suppliers and holds events in the province that include guests from across Canada and around the world. As an institute, IISD and its people demonstrate community pride by participating in Winnipeg's Green Commuter Challenge, Bike to Work Day, United Way of Winnipeg's annual campaign and in other activities.

We are proud to give back to our home province by applying our expertise here.

Our current work in Manitoba

• A Community Indicators System for the City of Winnipeg
  IISD has partnered with The United Way of Winnipeg to explore how to create a community indicators system for Winnipeg that would measure and report on progress in the quality of life of its citizens. Between 2003 and 2005, dozens of Winnipeggers have come to workshops and planning groups to consider the feasibility of such a system.

• Sustainability Indicators for Winnipeg's Urban First Nations Community
  IISD is working with Winnipeg's First Nations people to establish sustainability indicators that are reflective of the urban community and their identified issues and concerns. The initiative involves working collaboratively with community members and organizations to build lasting capacity at the local level in order to set up, maintain and use indicators to improve decision-making. The ultimate goal is to make a positive impact on human well-being, economic development and environmental sustainability.

• Building Capacity for Ecological Infrastructure Investments in the Red River Basin
  This research initiative is being developed by IISD with the assistance of the Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM) and the Red River Basin Commission (RRBC) to build capacity within municipalities and counties, by jointly developing methodologies to examine the costs and benefits of investing in maintaining and restoring natural environments (or ecological infrastructure) to improve water quality within and outside their jurisdictions.

• Lake Winnipeg Stewardship/Netley-Libau Wetlands Research
  IISD is working a number of projects designed to improve the management of the Lake Winnipeg watershed.

• Manitoba's Department of Science, Technology, Energy and Mines
  IISD is working with the department's Climate and Energy Branch to support a broad range of mitigation policy initiatives and the introduction of adaptive strategies that will reduce vulnerability to ongoing and future climatic changes.

• Manitoba's Department of Education, Citizenship and Youth
  IISD is working with the department on its activities related to the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.

• Manitoba Water Soft Paths
  IISD, in partnership with Manitoba Water Stewardship, has undertaken a program to provide a policy framework to achieve sustainable water resources management. The project is a multi-year program in which we analyze current water use in parts of Manitoba, south of, and including, the Winnipeg River and Saskatchewan River watersheds. As well, we analyze future water availability in these watersheds under climate change scenarios.

• Adaptation as Resilience Building
  The project was based on the premise that prairie agro-ecosystems, or the inter-relationship between social and ecological systems in the prairie region, have been continuously adapting (successfully and unsuccessfully) to historic climate variability.

• The Pimachiowin Aki World Heritage Site Project
  IISD is helping this partnership of five First Nations and the governments of Manitoba and Ontario to establish a UNESCO World Heritage Site for a large section of boreal forest that straddles the Manitoba-Ontario border east of Lake Winnipeg.

• Evaluation of the Impact of the Sustainable Development Innovation Fund
  The project involves tracking the number and type of projects funded over the last four years and to measure the impact of these projects on Manitoba's sustainability.

• IISD Internships
  IISD runs a number of important internship programs for young professionals. Over the years, IISD has placed about 350 Canadian interns, including about 30 Manitobans, in exciting international positions.

• Manitoba Hydro
  IISD is assisting Manitoba Hydro with a scenario planning exercise to help identify future climate change impacts and strategies for adaptation.

• Technical support to Manitoba Treasury Board Secretariat
  For the past four years, IISD has been working with Manitoba Finance's Treasury Board Secretariat in capacity building efforts for the use of outcome-based indicators in government planning and reporting.

• Manitoba Provincial Sustainability Report
  IISD is assisting Manitoba Conservation in its efforts to prepare the province's second Sustainability Report.

Highlights of earlier IISD work in Manitoba

• Manitoba Clean Environment Commission's Hog Production Industry Review Task 1, Task 2 (2007)
  In Manitoba, one of the largest environmental concerns is the sustainability of its water resources. In light of this critical issue, the CEC asked IISD for its assistance to fulfill the terms of reference of the review of environmental protection measures relating to hog production in Manitoba.

• Manitoba Provincial Sustainability Report (2005; 1997)
  The province's first pilot sustainable development report focusing on Manitoba's Prairie Ecozone was published in 1997, as a result of close collaboration between Manitoba Conservation and IISD. Manitoba's first full-scale sustainable development report was published in 2005.

• Environmental Improvement Zones (EIZ): A model for engaging Winnipeg neighbourhoods in local action; Considerations for implementation in Winnipeg. (2005) (PDF - 750 kb)
  The study reviewed the history of environmental communications and decision-making across the neighbourhoods of Winnipeg, and examined precedents in other municipalities, with some guidance on how the neighbourhood approach might work in Winnipeg. The subsequent Guide to environmental issues in Winnipeg neighbourhoods (2005) (PDF - 910 kb) identified key environmental issues and suggested strategic activities that neighbourhoods could undertake, based on pilot exercises in the neighbourhoods of Whyte Ridge, Riverview and West Broadway.

• The Prairie Water Policy Symposium (2005)
  The Prairie Water Policy Symposium (PWPS) was hosted by IISD on September 22–23, 2005, in Winnipeg, at The Forks of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers. This event brought together approximately 100 policy-makers, researchers and scientists from across the country.

• Realizing Opportunities: Emissions trading in Manitoba (2004) (PDF - 1.4 mb)
  IISD served as the Secretariat for a Manitoba task force on emissions trading and released a report on how the province could take advantage of economic opportunities.

• Kyoto Mechanisms and the Manitoba Business Sector (2003) and Agriculture and Carbon Management (2002)
  IISD hosted two workshops that examined the implications and opportunities associated with climate change for the agricultural and business sectors of Manitoba.

• Manitoba Climate Change Task Force (2001)
  IISD worked with the Manitoba Clean Environment Commission (CEC) to support the activities of the Manitoba Climate Change Task Force. Formed in 2001, the task force examined the environmental challenges and economic opportunities for Manitoba associated with climate change.

• Manitoba and Climate Change: A Primer (2001)
  IISD collaborated with the CEC to develop a booklet entitled Manitoba and Climate Change: A Primer. This booklet provides an introduction to the implications of climate change for Manitoba, and contains analysis of the science and international and Canadian responses to this environmental phenomenon.

• KyotoSmart
  IISD served as the Secretariat for the KyotoSmart Network, of which the Province of Manitoba is a founding member.

• City of Winnipeg Quality of Life Indicators (1996) (PDF - 320 kb)
  Plan Winnipeg, a strategic plan for the City of Winnipeg, identified high quality of life as the key element in the community's vision for the future. To make this vision a reality, it was essential to identify and monitor key measurable elements of the vision.

• The Great Plains Program (1993)
  IISD's Great Plains Program began with the convening of stakeholders across the Canadian Prairies to articulate their needs on sustainability issues.

• Skownan First Nation Community Values Project: Integrating Aboriginal Values into Land Use and Resource Management
  Between January 2000 and June 2001, IISD partnered with Skownan First Nation, formerly called Waterhen First Nation, to explore how Aboriginal people value the lands around them and how this information can be incorporated into Manitoba's land-use and resource management activities.

• Our Responsibility to the Seventh Generation: Indigenous Peoples and Sustainable Development
  This 1992 report was produced with the active involvement of many Indigenous people from Canada, Mexico and India, and the support of the Ma Mawi Wi Chi Itata Centre in Winnipeg, Canada. IISD continues to receive many requests for this publication.

Institutional Memberships in Manitoba

• Manitoba Eco-Network
• Climate Change Connection
• Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce
• Manitoba Chamber of Commerce
• Manitoba Council for International Cooperation
• University of Winnipeg Global College Advisory Board

Manitoba Board Members

• Emőke J.E. Szathmáry, Professor and President Emeritus, University of Manitoba (Winnipeg)

• Charles Loewen, President and Chief Executive Officer, Loewen Windows (Steinbach)

Manitoba Advisory Participant

• Paul Vogt, Clerk of the Executive Council, Province of Manitoba (Winnipeg)

Learn more about the Province of Manitoba and the City of Winnipeg.

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