This sub-program helps participants understand what is meant by competent institutions and how and why they are critical to sustainable development.  It looks carefully into institutional issues and processes to understand how good institutions can emerge—even in unfavorable environments—and how to identify and support catalysts for change.  We emphasize the importance of thinking long term and understanding the dynamics between social issues, the environment, economic growth, and poverty reduction. The objective is to help the participants apply a range of sustainability concepts to their local situations, cultures, traditions and institutional structures.   Practical case examples and the experiential approach  are used to help participants encourage “learning institutions” that:

• listen (understand and assess different points of view),
• think (analyze the problems and develop solutions), and
• act (apply the solutions and learn from what works and does not work on the ground).  

This sub-program integrates institutional concepts into existing courses on “Good Environmental Governance” and “Strategic Environmental Assessment” as a means of providing specialized tools for broader national and regional planning.  The sub-program will be introduced for the first time in Vietnam, and it will be scaled up in 3 countries (China, Madagascar and Morocco) working closely with local training partners and our regional ESSD and PREM colleagues. 

There will be a corporate sector event on good environmental governance for Thailand, and exchange of knowledge on various initiatives to assess capacity for environmental governance in the East Asia region.  Other new activities under this sub-program include: (a) developing capacity building modules on Environment and Health for educational institutions in Tanzania and Uganda and (b) assessment and development of country systems for environment and social safeguards in two countries.