6. 2006 Report of the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development

A key consideration in measuring our progress on sustainable development is the assessment of our program by the Commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development (CESD). The CESD has a mandate to monitor federal departments' and agencies' implementation of their SD Strategies. Audits are one tool used by the CESD to assess performance against expected results. Audit results provide important insights and directional information for the CRA.

In its 2006 Annual Report to Parliament, the CESD examined the progress made by federal departments and agencies toward meeting specific commitments in their sustainable development strategies. The CESD looked at 39 commitments published in the strategies of 21 departments. Among the commitments chosen for 2006 was the CRA's commitment to "Integrate sustainability criteria into negotiations, discussions, partnerships, and decision-making with provinces and territories, and other government agencies/ departments on CRA business." (Target 2.2.1 under Goal 2 of the SD Strategy)[Footnote 8]

The CESD observed that, at the time of the audit, satisfactory progress had been made on establishing a definition for sustainability criteria, and in identifying opportunities for the inclusion of criteria. However, the Commissioner rated progress on integrating the criteria (into identified documents and guidelines) as unsatisfactory. The CESD concluded that the CRA had achieved overall satisfactory progress on this selected commitment. In response, the CRA committed to continuing to work to advance this commitment by including the criteria in the identified guide documents for developing partnership agreements.

Footnote

[Footnote 8]

The full 2006 report of the CESD is available at:
http://www.oag-bvg.gc.ca/internet/English/aud_parl_cesd_200609_e_936.html.

Date modified:

2008-03-27