Committee on Sustainability Assessment (COSA)

Cosa facilitates the collective impact of institutions dedicated to accelerating rural prosperity & agricultural Sustainability in the world's poorest countries. Driven by the conviction that reliable data enables better decision-making & greater accountability, we develop & share pragmatic indicators & solutions to better measure & manage sustainability.creating a "public square" for alignment of purpose & understanding serves everyone equally. The cosa network is an incubator of lessons that catalyze fact-based decision-making to improve Sustainability programs in food & agriculture. (continued on schedule o)we collaborate with a diverse set of partners from research institutes & development agencies to private companies & foundations - in order to build local capacity in many countries & among tens of thousands of farmers. Our core work is four pronged:1) design - cosa works together with partners & local communities to design & implement Sustainability assessments that address the important challenges that they face. By working through local organizations cosa improves their practices, ensures local relevance, & helps them conform to international standards of best practices so that they can know the actual impacts or long term Sustainability of diverse types of projects or investments in rural communities.2) measure - we apply a consistent, standardized approach which ensures comparability, provides clarity, & reduces costs. Cosa trains & supports local entities or institutions with tools & services to conduct the hands-on fieldwork & assessments themselves. This ensures the capacity building that is necessary for long term adoption of sound monitoring and Assessment practices. Evidence-based scientific methods form the core of the work.3) manage - for Sustainability practices to be cost-effective requires that entities have the right information at the right time. Cosa tools & technologies help to improve management choices so that organizations can quickly apply the most sustainable practices that reduce environmental & economic vulnerability among farm communities.4) share & disseminate - cosa advances a community of learning by making information & lessons available to farmers, rural organizations & the Sustainability Assessment community as a whole. This service is especially valuable in low resource countries where, for the first time, governments, companies, ngos, farmers, & researchers (the community) have a mutual & transparent way to share their understanding & advance the best economic, social, & environmental practices.