About evaluations of sustainable development

Sustainable development: from vision to practice

Since the Brundtland Report was published in 1987, sustainable development evolved from a vague vision to a set of basic principles, guiding decisions and actions at various levels. Countries, for example, are developing and implementing strategies for sustainable development in order to reshape their policies accordingly. Thousands of municipalities worldwide are engaged in Local Agenda 21 activities, which address sustainable development at the local level. More than 60,000 businesses of all sizes have introduced environmental management systems or are publishing sustainability reports as a response to stakeholder demands and as a means to create long-term competitiveness. As a consequence, sustainable development also plays an increasingly important role for investors. These various actors have one request in common: they all call for reliable information on sustainability performance. The only solid way of generating such information is through professional evaluation, i.e. neutral and fact-based.

Evaluation of sustainable development: A cutting-edge topic

Professional evaluations, which are based on scientifically tested concepts and methods, provide decision makers in both public and private sectors with reliable information. They document both drawbacks and progress, and identify related obstacles and success factors. By doing so, they also support learning processes in a systematic way. Evaluating sustainable development , however, forces both contractors as well as evaluators to confront new challenges. These challenges and solutions to them will be addressed in the EASY-ECO Series.