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Published in Summer 2005
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'Think Continentally - Act Locally'
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It’s hard to argue with the old bumper sticker call to action, "Think Globally, Act Locally."
At the Commission for Environmental Cooperation, we certainly think on a continental scale as an organization designed to support the conservation of North America’s shared environment in the context of free trade. But we also act locally, too.
The CEC is a trinational partnership—Canada, Mexico and the United States working together to accomplish what cannot be accomplished alone. But getting the job done, of course, requires much more than the combined efforts of national authorities.
In fact, one of the noteworthy features of the CEC’s twelfth annual Council session this June in Quebec City is the participation of environment ministers and officials from two of the Canadian provinces that are signatories to an intergovernmental accord on the North American Agreement for Environmental Cooperation that created the CEC: Alberta and Quebec.
While their participation in the annual meeting of North America’s top environmental officials is significant in terms of our Council session, it is but a small example of ongoing cross-border government-to-government environmental cooperation. In fact, at the project level, the CEC works with a vast number of state, provincial, regional, and even municipal-level governments, in addition to other partners in nongovernmental and private sector organizations.
The cooperation of local officials is but one example of what we mean when we talk about the CEC as a catalyst and a forum for environmental cooperation that reaches across our national and other boundaries.
The CEC does not clean up toxic waste, test water, or impose fines. Our job is to provide the tools and analysis so that we can join forces to better protect our common environment as our continental economies grow closer.
Simply put, the information and analysis we produce helps citizens, industry and government tackle environmental challenges, whether managing hazardous chemicals, conserving biodiversity or encouraging sustainable development.
This approach was demonstrated recently in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, where the CEC was honored to participate in an announcement marking a key step towards the completion of Mexico’s first national air inventory. Joining us were state officials from Mexico, the US Western Governors’ Association, the US Environmental Protection Agency and Mexico’s environmental secretariat (Semarnat).
The officials had gathered to announce the completion of an air emissions inventory for six northern Mexican states as the foundation of a national air inventory to be completed later this year. This is an effort the CEC has consistently supported for the past four years. The information it generates will help air quality planners focus their efforts on the most important sources of air pollution harming the environment and the health of people living in border communities on both sides of the border. Compiling this information is a great example of cooperation that helps communities on both sides of the border to address shared air pollution problems and achieve shared public health goals.
Elsewhere in Mexico, the CEC is working with businesses taking a more holistic approach to pollution prevention by examining the supply-chain of product inputs to find new ways to cut pollution. And, at the local level we are targeting efforts to enhance state and municipal environmental management.
To the people who live in polluted border cities, those living next to an industrial area, or visitors to the smog-obscured Big Bend National Park, what matters is not the division of environmental labor, it’s the result gained by each of us doing our part to address the problem. We as citizens expect and need our authorities at every level to work in some measure of harmony and efficiency in tackling the important issues affecting our shared environment.
Which is why "Think Globally, Act Locally" is more than just a catchy slogan at the CEC.
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