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Mark Anielski President and CEO of Anielski Management Inc (AMI).

As an economist I work with communities, businesses and governments to help them assess, measure and manage their genuine wealth — the things that matter most to their well-being and quality of life. I believe that what we measure reveals our true values.

I believe we need to measure progress in terms of what matters most in our lives (quality of life) and use indicators of progress that align with those values. My vision is an economy of well-being focused on the quality of life conditions of households. Households, I believe, represent the original enterprise and are the key building blocks of vibrant, flourishing, and civil societies. Afterall, economics comes from the Greek (oikonomia) meaning prudent household management.

I operate our family-owned small business enterprise, Anielski Management Inc., on the principles of wisdom, integrity, moderation or sufficiency of material needs, and a commitment to sustainable stewardship of the genuine wealth of my community. My wife and I are co-shareholders in our corporation which is directly tied to our household. We operate on the principles of moderation and sustainability, earning a sufficient income to meet our basic needs while enjoying a high quality of life for our household. I give at least one-third of my eight-hour work day to the community in the form of private and community counsel on how to build sustainable, flourishing and genuine wealth communities and enterprises. My wife and I enjoy the benefits of a wealth of meaningful work with some of the most progressive clients in Canada and internationally who understand the wisdom of the prudent management of genuine wealth.

I am schooled in economics, accounting and forestry and hold a M.Sc. in forest economics, a B.A. in economics and B.Sc.F in forest science, all from the University of Alberta.

In May of 2007 my first book was published; The Economics of Happiness: Building Genuine Wealth by New Society Publishers. My book has become a Canadian best-seller and has won two book awards (the gold medal in the Nautilus book awards (Los Angeles) and a bronze medal in the Axiom book awards (New York). In the Economics of Happiness, I propose a new road map for developing economies of well-being for nations, communities and businesses using a model I call genuine wealth. The book contains examples of how genuine wealth is being developed all over the world from Edmonton to Innsbruck to Beijing. The genuine wealth model is a new approach to measuring and reporting on the conditions of well-being that matter most to people’s quality of life and to a sustainable world.

Since 2002 I have been an Adjunct Professor at the University of Alberta, School of Business where I teach MBA and business students about Corporate Social Responsibility and Social Entrepreneurship . I am also one of the founding faculty members of the Bainbridge Graduate Institute in Washington state where I taught ecological economics; BGI was the first sustainability MBA program in US with a goal to: “integrate the wisdom of sustainability, ethics, and social responsibility into business practice via management education and research .business sustainability, ethics and corporate social responsibility”.

Since 1999 I have served as a Senior Fellow with the Oakland-based economic policy think-tank, Redefining Progress. In 1999, along with economic journalist Jonathan Rowe, I completed the update to the U.S. Genuine Progress Indicator (GPI): a new measure of progress that accounts for the regrettable social and environmental depreciation costs that are otherwise treated as “growth” or as a benefit in the key economic performance statistic, the GDP (gross domestic product).

I am also an ecological economist by profession and am the past President (2003-2005) of the Canadian Society for Ecological Economics (CANSEE). I am an associate with the International Institute for Sustainable Development (WInnipeg) and a founding Board member of the International Sustainability Indicators Network (ISIN). In 2001, I served as advisor and contributing author to the Sustainability Reporting Guidelines of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) that now help businesses, worldwide, develop corporate sustainability and “triple-bottom-line” (economic-social-environmental) reports.

In 2001 I led a team of economists at the Pembina Institute (an Alberta-based environmental think-tank) in developing a prototype sustainability measurement system for the province of Alberta called Alberta Genuine Progress Indicators (GPI) Sustainable Well-being Accounting System. This comprehensive sustainability accounting exercise included 30 technical reports (see Publications) that tracked the sustainable progress of 51 key economic, social and environmental indicators from 1961-1999. Prior to the Alberta GPI study, in 2000 I led another Pembina research study to develop a prototype sustainability accounting framework for the Yukon called “The Sustainable Progress Indicators” to measure the sustainability of Yukon’s economy, environment and society.

One of my most rewarding projects was the completion of a Genuine Wealth Indicators framework for the Inuit of Nunvat in Canada’s eastern Arctic; the first genuine wealth measurement system for First Nations that aligns First Nation values with First Nation indicators of economic, social and environmental well-being.

In 2000, I co-authored a piece of Finance Minister Paul Martin’s 2000 Budget that dedicated $9 million over three years to the development of Canada’s first environment and sustainable development indicators, released in May of 2003. For those three years I sat on the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy (NRTEE) guiding the project. I was instrumental in shaping the NRTEE’s recommendation that the Government of Canada expand the System of National Accounts (from which GDP is derived) to include more detailed information on natural, human and, over time, social capital. If implemented, this would make Canada the first nation in the world to adopt a total capital accounting system that could measure the overall sustainability of the nation.

In a volunteer capacity I serve on the advisory board to E-SAGE (Edmontonians for a Sustainable and Green Economy). In the past, I have served on the board of the Edmonton City Centre Church Corporation, the Edmonton Social Planning Council and other organizations committed to advocating for the well-being of some our more economically disadvantaged citizens.

Adbusters magazine (Sept./Oct. 2004 issue) recently named me as one of the world’s “rising stars” and “visionaries” amongst economists who are leading the charge to revitalize economics. Also in 2004 I was awarded the international 2004 ECO Award in the category of the Kyoto Protocol for my work on genuine progress and well-being indicators.

My family and I try to live a sustainable and flourishing life-style in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.