David Runnalls is a Distinguished Fellow of IISD and of the Centre for International Governance Innovation. He is also Senior Fellow of Smart Prosperity Institute and visiting professor of Geography at the University of Ottawa.

He served as President of IISD for eleven years before stepping down in 2010. During this period the Institute experienced an unprecedented growth in programs and budget and became one of the half dozen premier institutions of its kind in the world.

He is Chair of the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development. He is a member of the Advisory Council for Export Development Canada; a member of the Council for Sustainable Development Technology Canada; and a member of the Committee for the Business Network for Sustainability. He also serves on the International Sustainability Innovation Council of Switzerland (ISIS), and the Shell Sustainability Report External Review Committee. He is a member of the Trade and Investment Task Force of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development and of the CIDA Advisory Committee on Evaluation.

An occasional writer and broadcaster, he has served as environment columnist for the CBC radio program, As it Happens and for CTV's Canada am. He was a member of the Discovery Channel's regular environment panel and political columnist for the Earth Times, the paper of record for the United Nations Earth Summit in 1992.