The development and implementation of ISDLaw requires the participation of non-lawyers as well as lawyers. Business people, civil society representatives, government officials, academics, economists, and many others must be involved.

Howard Mann has been training non-lawyers in the legal issues related to sustainable development for many years. He prepared and delivered a pioneering course for senior business and government officials for the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, and has been actively engaged with different organizations in the development of legally informed reading material and seminars on different ISDLaw concerns

Howard Mann has also testified on ISDLaw issues before several Parliamentary committees analyzing proposed legislation or studying other policy matters, and has served on several government-appointed advisory committees addressing sustainable development related issues.

Some samples of Dr. Mann's contributions in this area include:

Swiss Development Agency
In 2003, the Swiss Development Agency invited Howard Mann and other IISD associates to present a two day seminar on the relationship of international trade and investment agreements to sustainable development from a development agency perspective. Some twenty Swiss government officials participated in the course. The team has been asked to develop a second training program for 2004.

Develop module for a training course for the WTO
Howard Mann recently led an IISD team in developing a module for a training course for the WTO to deliver to developing country government and non-government personnel as part of their comprehensive trade capacity building program. The Trade and Sustainable Development module provided an outline for up-to-date, legal and policy driven understandings of the complex linkages between international trade and development issues. This was the first time the WTO had invited an outside, non-governmental organization to develop such materials.

Water, trade law and international investment agreement
Water, trade law and international investment agreements form a critical trilateral relationship. Over 2002-2003, organizers of the Hemispheric Forum on Water for the Americas (Mexico, October 2002), the Third World Water Forum (Japan, March 2003), and the Global Challenge Program on Water and Agriculture (Nairobi, November 2003) each invited Howard Mann to make presentations in non-technical language on the full range of international law issues that directly impact on water management choices at the community level.

The lead paper on the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety at the Second ASEAN Workshop on Measures to Align Trade and Environment
The Government of Thailand invited Howard Mann, in June 2000, to present the lead paper on the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety at the Second ASEAN Workshop on Measures to Align Trade and Environment. As part of the preparations for the Workshop, Dr. Mann met with the senior Thai officials dealing with biotechnology issues from the research, regulatory and policy perspectives. He also prepared and presented a special, interactive, half-day seminar on the Cartagena Protocol for over 40 non-lawyer government officials actively involved in biotechnology issues. . The final paper for the Workshop factored in the results of the initial meetings and special seminar, thus making it especially germane to the ASEAN participants.

A benchmark work for understanding the debate on trade and environment
Working as part of a team assembled by the International Institute for Sustainable Development, Howard Mann provided analysis and written content for a publication aimed at providing non-lawyers with a benchmark work for understanding the debate on trade and environment. He also provided a review of the legal accuracy of many sections of the book for which he was not the lead author. See Environment and Trade: A Handbook.

Indigenous Knowledge and traditional resources under the Convention on Biological Diversity
To assist Canada in implementing provisions relating to Indigenous Knowledge and traditional resources under the Convention on Biological Diversity, Canada established a so-called Article 8(j) Committee. The Committee was composed of national government, First Nations and academic representatives. Howard Mann was asked to assist the Committee as an expert resource person able to provide independent and objective legal advice to all participants on the Committee.