IIED

Registered Charity No 800066

Background
IIED is an international policy research institute and non governmental body working for more sustainable and equitable global development. Although based in London we work globally through a wide range of long-standing relationships with partners across the developing world. Some of these relationships go back since our beginning in 1971. Our partnerships generate close working relations with many key development actors from smallholder farmers and big city slum-dwellers to national governments and regional NGOs, global institutions and international processes. This well established practice of working in partnership is what we believe makes us fundamentally different from other research institutes.

Mission
IIED provides expertise in achieving sustainable development at local, national, and global levels. In alliance with others, we want to change a future that ends global poverty and ensures fair and sound management of the world’s resources.

Method of operation
Throughout its lifetime IIED has made its mark through innovative policy and practice using participatory methods and multi-stakeholder processes to develop policy that works for local livelihoods. We are committed to maintaining excellence throughout all our programme activities but are looking to achieve greater synergies between similar areas. To this end we now have five broader groups to help generate further innovation and new ways of working.
• Natural Resources – sustainable agriculture, biodiversity, drylands and forestry
• Climate Change - mitigation, adaptation and vulnerability
• Human Settlements – urban poverty, urban environment, rural-urban links
• Sustainable Markets – environment economics, corporate responsibility, regoverning markets, trade
• Governance – law, planning, global governance
Within these broad areas we have also identified a series of common themes to provide greater focus and map our work onto areas of greatest priority

History
Founded in 1971, as the International Institute for Environmental Affairs in the United States, today the institute comprises a multicultural, multilingual staff of over 70 people from 18 countries and is headquartered in London.