Canadian Environmental Sustainability Indicators

Canadians’ health, well-being and economic security are highly dependent on the quality of the environment. Reports of smog alerts, lakes with blue-green algae, or shrinking ice caps bring attention to changing conditions in the environment. Issues such as asthma, cardiovascular disease and waterborne illnesses underline linkages between the environment and human health. Environmental changes such as low water levels, pest infestations and intense storms also have economic impacts in such sectors as agriculture, forestry and tourism. 

Indicators provide a simple way to convey complex information on the environment, much like the gross domestic product, the consumer price index and the unemployment rate do for the economy. Through the Canadian Environmental Sustainability Indicators (CESI) initiative, the federal government reports on environmental indicators that track three issues of key concern to Canadians:

• Air Quality
• Water Quality
• Greenhouse Gas Emissions 

The overall conclusion of this year's report is that while water is of high quality in many areas and the ground-level ozone indicator shows slight signs of improvement in recent years, air quality, water quality and greenhouse gas emissions continue to be of concern.

CESI brings together environmental information from federal, provincial and territorial governments, who share responsibilities for environmental management in Canada. This year’s report places more emphasis on the international context and on the important relationships that exist between the economy, the environment, and human health and well-being.

To learn more about the CESI indicators click on the above indicator links. Alternatively, view the CESI Highlights report (in HTML format or in PDF format (185 KB)).

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