CANIFEX
INTERNATIONAL is a private, federally incorporated,
non-profit organization. It was founded in
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Founded by Dr. Mohan Munasinghe, Chief Energy Advisor to the government of Sri Lanka, and a Director of CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL.Dr. Munasinghe, an internationally recognized expert on energy, the environment and sustainable development, has spent more than twenty-five years as a senior advisor with the World Bank. He is also Vice Chair, Bureau of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Visiting Professor, Institute of Advanced Studies, United Nations University (Tokyo).
He established MIND as a private, non-profit, organization established to play a key role in nurturing communities of scholars who will address sustainable development issues world-wide, and explore viable means of achieving this goal in Sri Lanka without compromising its economic, environmental and socio-cultural integrity. It seeks to make development more sustainable by promoting education, training, research and dissemination of relevant knowledge in relevant fields, including the engineering, life, physical, and social sciences. MIND makes a practical contribution by identifying unsustainable elements in existing patterns of development, and by helping to balance and integrate the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. Specific activities include bursaries, scholarships and fellowships to undergraduate and post-graduate students, book donations to libraries, research studies, seminars and workshops, and distance learning activities in co-operation with both local and international partner institutions.
Founded by Gerald Gummersell of The Gummersell Group and Denis Daigneault of Dawson College in Montreal, both Directors of CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL.IER is a non-profit educational organization dedicated to the production of learning objects. It is a new, Canadian source of financial and technical support for educators working with learning technologies. The immediate goals of the Institute are to design, develop and produce interactive educational resources in the areas of science, business and history. The Institute also has a particular interest in aboriginal education.
Founded by Jean Chevrier, LLB, former legal counsel with the International Institute for the Prevention of Crime and now in private practice.New Federation House is an independent, non-profit corporation dedicated to public education on social, political and economic issues. It is in its second decade of publication of new federation magazine, an independent Canadian magazine of socio-political and socio-economic commentary, and recently published The Prime Ministers of Canada, a collection of original essays by leading Canadian historians.
By linking with MIND, IER and NEW FEDERATION HOUSE, CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL is in a position to immediately play a leading role in North America in the study of the environment and sustainable development. This would facilitate the establishment of networks of interested parties within both industrialized and developing countries. Indeed, the setting up of Trans-disciplinary curricula at the advanced graduate level would attract world recognized researchers and would enable the development of international distance learning courses to be made available globally.
With MIND's focus on Sustainable Development in developing countries and its appreciation of poverty, it is superbly placed to implement practical leadership training in sustainable development through such existing programs as the "International Youth Leaders of the South" based on the "Reverse Peace Corps Concept."
MIND will take a group of thirty leaders from the "South" through a six-week training course on sustainable development to create "Good Sustainability Ambassadors" at the community level. As part of its mandate, CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL would be able to develop similar core courses. Such training packages could in turn be delivered through distance learning techniques developed by IER, to support the activities of the ambassadors working through MIND in the "South."
Climate Change is another urgent and crucial challenge facing humanity in the 21st century to which CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL could make a major contribution. The work of world bodies like IPCC and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), indicate that investments in carbon emissions mitigation and carbon trading will be worth at least several hundred billion dollars per year by the end of this decade. The issues involve complex interaction among socio-economic and ecological systems on a planetary scale over decades or even centuries. Other key considerations such as poverty, equity, and international governance mechanisms add to the complexity.
MIND has already networked with leading researchers working on issues arising from the nexus of climate change and sustainable development. While there are other institutions researching these issues, the range of problems to be addressed far exceed their collective capabilities. CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL would be well placed to make this an area of emphasis in its work program.
It is important to be sensitive to the concerns of developing countries in promoting the dialogue between the "South" and the "North" through networks already established by MIND. This would allow CANIFEX INTERNATIONAL to contribute to a new global vision of "Making Development More Sustainable." In particular, decision-makers and citizens of developing countries (where issues like poverty reduction, health and nutrition have the highest priority) would be far more responsive to an approach that provided practical solutions to environmental problems if it were packaged within the broader perspective of sustainable development.
Copyright 2003
CANIFEX International
Revised 31 March 2005