Measuring sustainable development.

Organisation De Cooperation Et De Developpement Economiques, Nations Unies Commission Économique Pour L'Europe, Eurostat

Description

Le groupe de travail CEE-ONU/OCDE/EUROSTAT a été créé en 2005 afin d'identifier les concepts et bonnes pratiques pour aider les gouvernements nationaux et les organisations internationales dans la conception d'indicateurs de développement durable.
L'objectif est de développer un cadre conceptuel permettant d'identifier un ensemble restreint d'indicateurs pouvant devenir le noyau dur des comparaisons internationales.
Genève. http://temis.documentation.developpement-durable.gouv.fr/document.xsp?id=Temis-0066305

Sujets

• Développement durable
• Indicateur économique

Informations

• Publié par: temis-developpement-durable
• Publié le: 01 janvier 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 8
• Licence : En savoir +
  Paternité, pas d'utilisation commerciale, partage des conditions initiales à l'identique
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

UNITED NATIONS ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR EUROPE
MEASURING SUSTAINABLE
DEVELOPMENT
Prepared in cooperation with the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development and the Statistical Office of the
European Communities (Eurostat)
UNITED NATIONS
New York and Geneva, 2OO9 Note
The designations used and the presentation of the material in this publication do not
imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the
United Nations concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of
its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries.
Acknowledgements
This publication is the result of the fruitful two years of productive cooperation of the
members of the Joint UNECE/OECD/Eurostat Working Group on Statistics for
Sustainable Development and its Steering Committee, chaired by Robert Smith from
Statistics Canada.
The work has benefited from the valuable contributions by the members of the
Working Group who actively participated in the meetings. During the course of the
work, many members of the Working Group and its Steering Committee have
contributed papers as an input to the discussions. The list of authors who contributed
papers is presented in the Bibliography of this publication.
The Bureau of the Conference of European Statisticians has provided constructive
guidance and assistance to the Working Group throughout the work.
The UNECE provided secretariat support to the Working Group. The OECD and
Eurostat also supported the work. Statistics Norway and the Norwegian Ministry of
Finance have given financial support to research papers and to the Editor of the report.
ECE/CES/77
Copyright © United Nations, 2009
All rights reserved
Printed at United Nations, Geneva, Switzerland FOREWORD
Sustainable development is a popular and important concept, but one that is open to a variety of
interpretations. Since the 1987 Brundtland report (World Commission on Environment and
Development, 1987), many researchers in universities, environmental organizations, think-tanks,
national governments and international agencies have offered proposals for measuring
sustainable development. The wide variety of indicators in existing national and international
policy-based sets testifies to the difficulty of the challenge.
The Joint UNECE/OECD/Eurostat Working Group on Statistics for Sustainable Development
was established in 2005 to identify good concepts and practices to assist national governments
and international organizations in the design of sustainable development indicator sets. The aim
of the Working Group was to develop a broad conceptual framework for measuring sustainable
development with the concept of capital at its centre, and to identify a small set of indicators that
might become the core set for international comparisons.
The Working Group had more than 90 members from 48 countries and international
organizations who worked together to develop a framework for measuring sustainable
development. The Working Group met five times during the period April 2006 to March 2008
and was led by a Steering Committee which provided governance and continuity between the
meetings.
This publication is the result of the Working Group’s efforts. It thoroughly explores the capital
approach to measuring sustainable development and compares the indicators that result from this
approach with those in already existing indicator sets. In this way, it draws the best from the
conceptual work of researchers and the practical work of policy makers and statisticians. It is
hoped that this work will provide an impetus for further work on statistics for sustainable
development in national statistical offices.
Executive Secretary and Under Secretary-General
United Nations Economic Commission for Europe
iiiCONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.........................................................................................................................1
A. BACKGROUND..........................................................................................................................................1
B.BASIC CONCEPTS......2
C.COMMONALITIES IN EXISTING POLICY-BASED INDICATOR SETS..................................................3
D.THE CAPITAL APPROACH IN THEORY ..................................................................................................5
E.LIMITATIONS ON THE THEORETICAL CAPITAL APPROACH.............................................................6
F.A PRACTICAL SET OF CAPITAL-BASED INDICATORS........................................................................6
G.COMPARING THE APPROACHES ..........................................................................................................10
H.CONCLUSION...........13
Chapter I: INTRODUCTION................................................................................................................15
A. THE WORKING GROUP ON STATISTICS FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT ..............................16
Background............................................................................................................................................16
Steering Committee of the Working Group .................................................................................17
B. BASIC CONCEPTS....18
C.WHAT IS UNDERSTOOD BY DEVELOPMENT?...................................................................................18
DELL-BEING............19
E.WBY SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT? ........................................................20
F.TWO VIEWS OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND CURRENT WELL-BEING............................21
G.ON THE NEED FOR A CONCEPTUAL APPROACH...............................................................................23
H.ON ADHERENCE TO THE PRINCIPLES OF OFFICIAL STATISTICS ...................................................24
I.ON THE APPROPRIATE GEOGRAPHICAL SCALE FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
INDICATORS.............25
Chapter II: OVERVIEW OF EXISTING APPROACHES.......................................................27
A. INTRODUCTION AND BRIEF HISTORY OF EXISTING INDICATOR SETS.........................................27
B.POLICY-BASED INDICATORS – THE PREDOMINANT APPROACH ..................................................29
C.STATUS, THEMES AND COMMONALITIES – A COMPARISON OF EXISTING INDICATOR SETS .30
D.CASE STUDIES ........................................................................................................................................34
The European Union ...........................................................................................................................35
United Kingdom....37
Switzerland.............39
Chapter III: THE CAPITAL APPROACH TO SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT:
THEORY..........................43
A. THE ROLE OF CAPITAL IN SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT .............................................................43
Theories of economic development................................................................................................45
Measuring total national wealth.......................................................................................................46
Summary.................................................................................................................................................47
B. THE CATEGORIES OF CAPITAL ............................................................................................................48
Financial capital....48
Produced capital....49
Natural capital........49
Human capital........51
Social capital..........52
vC. LIMITATIONS TO THE IDEAL CAPITAL FRAMEWORK .....................................................................54
Limitations on valuation ....................................................................................................................54
Critical capital.......................................................................................................................................56
Chapter IV: IMPLEMENTING THE CAPITAL APPROACH IN PRACTICAL
TERMS..............................59
A. ECONOMIC WEALTH – A PRACTICAL MONETARY INDICATOR.....................................................59
B. COMPLETING THE PRACTICAL INDICATOR SET...............................................................................61
Additional stock indicators ...............................................................................................................61
Flow indicators in a practical set.....................................................................................................64
Summarizing the practical set of capital-based indicators.......................................................66
C. A CAPITAL-BASED MEASUREMENT FRAMEWORK..........................................................................67
The System of Integrated Environmental and Economic Accounts......................................68
D. A NOTE ON DISTRIBUTIONAL ISSUES IN THE CAPITAL APPROACH .............................................70
E. POLICY IMPLICATIONS OF THE CAPITAL APPROACH .....................................................................70
Helping focus on the long-term determinants of development...............................................70
Cl