There is a tiny island in the Bay of Fundy which is home to one of the most charismatic birds. The puffins of Machias Seal Island have been there for a long time, but they are facing threats to their survival. One possible option to aid them is the creation of a marine protected area around their home.
To read more about their story, and see many wonderful pictures by Nick Hawkins, follow this link to “The Puffins of Machias Seal Island”.
CPAWS applauds today’s announcement of $1.3 billion dollars over 5 years to protect Canada’s land, ocean, and wildlife. This unprecedented investment will enable Canada to achieve its commitment to protect at least 17% of our land and freshwater by 2020. To date, Canada has protected 10.6% of our landscape. In New Brunswick, 4.6 % is currently protected.
“Today’s historic federal investment in protecting wildlands and wildlife could be a game-changer for nature conservation across Canada, including in New Brunswick,” says Roberta Clowater, Executive Director of CPAWS New Brunswick Chapter. “Budget 2018 recognizes the scale of the biodiversity crisis we face, the need to move quickly to deliver on our promises, and the need to support efforts by all levels of government, civil society, and other partners to protect our treasured natural heritage.”
For the first time, the federal budget not only allocates funding for federal action on nature conservation, but also includes significant support for provinces, territories, and Indigenous governments’ work to establish more protected areas. This cost-shared model is similar to the approach used to deliver other shared priorities in Canada, such as infrastructure, climate change mitigation, and health care.
Highlights of federal Budget 2018 conservation investments include:
“While there are few details available at this early stage, we are hopeful this is an opportunity for the New Brunswick government to secure much needed funding to support the creation of new protected areas in our province, such as the Restigouche Wilderness, and important coastal habitats,” says Roberta Clowater, Executive Director of CPAWS NB Chapter. “With this additional support we hope to see the provincial government establish an action plan, and start to take action to protect these and other crucial natural areas.”
“We are particularly pleased to see the budget acknowledge the leadership of Indigenous peoples in conservation across Canada, and we hope this funding will help advance their work in New Brunswick, which could also contribute to reconciliation between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples,” says Clowater.
“We thank the federal government for listening to the recommendations made by CPAWS and our environmental partners in the Green Budget Coalition,” says Alison Woodley, CPAWS’ National Conservation Director, “and we deeply appreciate the efforts of many thousands of Canadians who wrote to the Finance Minister, and of the 116 parliamentarians who signed an open letter supporting our recommendations. Today’s investment confirms how much Canadians care about this issue and shows that raising our collective voice truly works!”
“Investing in protected areas will conserve Canada’s wildlife, water, and wilderness, provide more protected spaces for healthy outdoor activities, and create jobs in communities across the country by growing sustainable nature and culture-based tourism economies,” says Woodley. “This is an investment in the future of our country, which will deliver huge returns.”
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For interviews:
Roberta Clowater: rclowater@cpaws.org; 506-452-9902
BACKGROUND
The UN Convention on Biological Diversity
In 2010, Canada and other signatories to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity endorsed a strategic plan to reverse a global biodiversity crisis, including a commitment to protect at least 17% of land and inland waters and 10% of ocean areas by 2020 and to improve the quality of protected area networks. The Biodiversity Convention (known as the CBD) was signed in 1992 alongside the UN Convention on Climate Change, recognizing the need to jointly tackle these two critical environmental challenges. Last year the federal government invested in a Pan-Canadian Climate Plan. This year’s investment will support a parallel pan-Canadian effort to protect biodiversity.
The Federal Government’s Recent Efforts towards Achieving Our Commitment
In March 2017, a unanimous report by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development made a suite of recommendations for action on protected areas.[1] In February 2017, federal, provincial, and territorial governments launched the “Pathway to Canada Target One” process, working with Indigenous peoples, civil society, and private interests to jointly deliver on Canada’s land and freshwater protection target.[2] CPAWS staff were appointed to a Ministerial “National Advisory Panel” to advise on this work. The Panel’s report is expected to be released soon.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada has been leading federal government efforts towards protecting at least 10% of the ocean by 2020, and has made significant progress over the past two years, including the establishment of the Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound glass sponge reef MPA in BC, and St Anns Bank MPA in Nova Scotia.
[1] http://www.ourcommons.ca/DocumentViewer/en/42-1/ENVI/report-5/
[2] http://www.conservation2020canada.ca/home
In its latest annual report on the state of protected areas in Canada, the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) is calling Canada out for ranking last among G7 countries in the percentage of land and freshwater protected for nature. CPAWS’ 2017 report “From Laggard to Leader? Canada’s renewed focus on protecting nature could deliver results,” encourages federal, provincial, and territorial governments to step up their protection efforts in order to conserve Canada’s natural heritage, and deliver on our international commitment.
Read the full report.
Read the Executive Summary with recommendations.
For interviews, contact: Karen Turner (613) 569-7226 x 232.
As the effects of climate change increase, most species will experience shifts in their natural home ranges in the north and at higher elevations. The following factors play a key role in how well plants and animals can adapt to changes in their environment.
Time: Many species can adapt quickly by migrating to more suitable habitat or altering their patterns. Other species, especially plants, require longer periods to adapt. If the pace of change is too quick, extinction becomes a risk.
Genetic variability: Larger populations of a given species are more likely to survive through simple evolution, while endangered species have lower genetic variability.
Availability of alternate habitat: To adapt and survive, many species have to move to more suitable habitat, if available. In an increasingly developed landscape, finding new habitat may be very difficult.
Food sources: A change in temperature affects when animals produce their young, hibernate and migrate, and when plants bloom and fruit. As species adapt at different rates, the likelihood exists that some animals may not be able to find suitable food sources at the right time, causing more stress to the species.
The international Two Countries, One Forest network recognizes the Restigouche as one of 5 critical ecological linkages in the northern New England / southern Quebec / Maritimes region. Yet, government has protected from development less than 3 percent of the watershed in New Brunswick, leaving most areas open for mining, logging or new development proposals. Forest management plans show that most of the wildest areas of forest on Crown land will be logged within 5 to 10 years. This will remove habitat around salmon streams and for wildlife that need old forests.Moose, black bears, American marten, fisher, bald eagles, barred owls, scarlet tanagers and numerous interior forest birds thrive amidst forest-covered hills, deep gorges and some of the most pristine rivers and streams in Eastern Canada.
Atlantic salmon – The Restigouche River and its tributaries support one of the most productive wild Atlantic salmon populations, with some of the largest salmon, in eastern Canada.
Canada lynx – Restigouche natural areas are home to critical populations of Canada lynx. The area provides a natural corridor for lynx to disperse for feeding and breeding between the Gaspé and northern Maine.
The provincial government created new Protected Natural Areas in 2014. This brought New Brunswick’s proportion of protected land up to 4.7 percent of the province. The national average is 10 percent.
At the same time, government removed conservation from more than one-quarter of our public land they used to manage to conserve fish, wildlife habitat and our rivers. The forestry industry has access to these previously conserved habitats for increased logging and clear-cutting. Researchers are very concerned that it will be difficult to conserve viable populations of all our wildlife under this plan.
The strategy puts at risk our cold-water rivers and their wild Atlantic salmon populations. Old forests in the headwaters of the Restigouche and Miramichi Rivers used to provide shady habitat, but now are open for increased clear-cutting.
At the same time, government will allow industry to double the amount of tree plantations, to occupy one-quarter of Crown forests. Tree plantations are NOT the same as old growth mixed forests, and take away habitat vital for the survival of native wildlife such as barred owls, flying squirrels and American marten.
For our forests to be resilient to climate change, we need to conserve diversity and natural forests. The current strategy is reducing natural diversity in forests and along waterways. This increases the risk new or increased pests and diseases, droughts, floods and fires will degrade our forests.
Fredericton – In its latest annual report on the state of protected areas in Canada, the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) is calling upon New Brunswick to step up efforts to protect more land by 2020. CPAWS’ 2017 report “From Laggard to Leader? Canada’s renewed focus on protecting nature could deliver results” calls Canada out for ranking last among G7 countries in the percentage of land and freshwater protected for conservation purposes, and encourages governments to conserve Canada’s natural heritage, starting by delivering on their international commitment. New Brunswick ranks 2nd to last among the Canadian provinces and territories.
With only 10.6% of its landscape currently protected, Canada lags behind the global average of 15%, and also trails other large countries such as China, Brazil, and Australia. In 2010, as part of a worldwide effort to stem the tide of biodiversity loss, Canada committed under the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity to protecting at least 17%of land and inland waters by 2020 and improving the quality of their protected area systems to more effectively conserve nature.
The report recognizes that Canadian governments are finally starting to take this commitment seriously after years of inaction. In February 2017, federal, provincial and territorial Ministers responsible for parks and protected areas publicly announced their commitment to work together to achieve this target. A new Pathway to 2020 process was initiated, and the Indigenous Circle of Experts and National Advisory Panel appointed to advise Ministers on this work.
“In New Brunswick, there has been no progress on working towards the national protected areas targets,” says Roberta Clowater, Executive Director of CPAWS New Brunswick. “There are steps that can be taken by the province immediately to help Canada reach our goals, including setting a target to increase protected areas, developing an action plan to 2020 and beyond, and protecting the Restigouche Wilderness Waterway.”
“With less than 3 years to fulfill our 2020 commitment, we need to get going now,” adds Hébert-Daly. “In the report we identify places across Canada where a considerable amount of work has already been done on proposed protected areas. By acting now to permanently protect these sites, while also planning for what’s needed to conserve nature in the long term, Canada has a chance to move from laggard to leader.”
Clowater adds, “The New Brunswick government could create a world-class wilderness tourism destination by establishing the Restigouche Wilderness Waterway – a wide protected corridor along the river, on Crown land. Currently, 97% of the New Brunswick portion of the Restigouche watershed is open to development, and industrial development is eating away at the region’s wild forests and rivers year by year. By conserving this area’s special nature, promising ecotourism businesses could reliably promote a quality wilderness destination to nature-seeking tourists around the world.”
Protected areas are important to conserve wildlife and wilderness, as well as provide clean air and water for all Canadians, store carbon, and play a major role in improving our health and well-being. They also make economic sense. Protected areas around the world generate US$600 billion per year in direct spending, while costing less than US$10 billion per year to manage.
For over 50 years, CPAWS has been working with all levels of government, and other partners across the country to protect more of Canada’s public lands. As the only nationwide charity dedicated to the protection of our public lands and water, we are uniquely positioned to help governments protect what nature really needs.
For interviews, contact: Roberta Clowater, rclowater@cpaws.org; 506-452-9902
Read the full report. http://cpaws.org/uploads/CPAWS-Parks-Report-2017.pdf
Read the Executive Summary with recommendations. http://cpaws.org/uploads/CPAWS-Parks-Report-Executive-Summary-2017.pdf
The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS) today responded to Minister Dominic LeBlanc’s announcement about Fisheries and Oceans Canada policy and sites regarding Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs).
“While we appreciate the efforts that Minister LeBlanc and his department have made to be the first government in the world to develop explicit policy on marine OECMs, we are concerned that neither the policy nor the sites announced today meet the test set out by the Convention on Biological Diversity to protect biodiversity as a whole”, said Sabine Jessen, CPAWS National Ocean Program Director. “As long as other industrial activities are being allowed in these areas, it is difficult to see them as ‘marine refuges’, as DFO has labeled them.”
Signatory countries, including Canada, to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), have agreed to meet Aichi Target 11, which commits governments to:
By 2020, at least 17 per cent of terrestrial and inland water, and 10 per cent of coastal and marine areas, especially areas of particular importance for biodiversity and ecosystem services, are conserved through effectively and equitably managed, ecologically representative and well connected systems of protected areas and other effective area-based conservation measures, and integrated into the wider landscapes and seascapes.
Under the CBD convention, in-situ conservation of biological diversity means that the areas counted towards Aichi Target 11 should be managed to achieve the conservation of ecosystems and natural habitats and the maintenance and recovery of viable populations of species in their natural surroundings. With only 3 years left to meet these ambitious targets, countries around the world are racing against the clock to put new protection measures in place. In Canada, only 1% of our ocean territory is currently protected.
“In Canada, the Canadian Council on Ecological Areas (www.ccea.org) has been working for the past 5 years with the protected areas community of practice to develop science-based guidance for the identification and reporting of OECMs on land and in the sea. We are concerned that DFO’s approach is not consistent with emerging guidance from the CCEA and could also undermine efforts to define OECMs on land”, said Alison Woodley, CPAWS National Parks Program Director.
“The DFO policy is also not consistent with the emerging international consensus on OECM guidance being developed for the CBD by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN)”, noted Jessen. “The draft IUCN guidance and the CCEA guidance are clear that any sites contributing toward the CBD Aichi Target 11, should be effective at conserving biodiversity. That cannot happen if these areas are left vulnerable to industrial-scale fishing, oil and gas exploration and development, and other industrial uses, which should be expressly prohibited.”
“In reviewing the sites that are being counted, we are concerned that the ancient and globally unique Strait of Georgia glass sponge reefs in BC, while protected from all bottom contact fishing, remain vulnerable to anchoring and cable laying and fail to consider the ecosystem linkages between the surface waters and seafloor ecosystem,” said Jessen.
“In the Gulf of St. Lawrence, based upon the information provided so far, the scallop buffer zones only restrict scallop fishing, and all other activities would be allowed to continue,” noted Roberta Clowater, Executive Director of CPAWS-New Brunswick. “This single restriction is not likely to contribute much to protecting overall biodiversity in these zones from current or future industrial activity.”
“In the case of the 3O coral closure, we are concerned that scientific advice that the closure should include areas within the 400m to 800m depth contour, has not been addressed,” noted Tanya Edwards, Co-Executive Director, CPAWS Newfoundland and Labrador Chapter. “In addition, while corals and sponges are being protected through the prohibition of bottom contact fishing, the other ecological values and linkages within the pelagic realm are being completely ignored.”
“While these sites each have some interim steps toward protection of specific elements of biodiversity, CPAWS believes that they all need additional measures to provide long-term protection for all elements of biodiversity, before they can count towards meeting the CBD target”, said Jessen.
Contacts:
Sabine Jessen, 604-657-2813 sabine@cpawsbc.org
Roberta Clowater, 506-452-9902 rclowater@cpaws.org
Tanya Edwards, 709-726-5800 tedwards@cpaws.org
For further information about the CCEA guidance on OECMs see: http://www.ccea.org/aichi-target-11-guidance/
For further information about the IUCN guidance on OECMs see: https://www.iucn.org/theme/protected-areas/wcpa/what-we-do/other-effective-area-based-conservation-measures-oecms
[The following commentary appeared in The Daily Gleaner on April 5, 2017.]
For the first time since 1992, Canadian governments are working together to expand our network of protected areas to conserve nature. The federal government and all provinces and territories recently agreed to work on a plan to meet international targets for protected areas.
In 2010, Canada committed to protecting at least 17 per cent of land and 10 per cent of our ocean by 2020, under the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity.
New Brunswick needs to contribute to this plan and report on actions. Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society – NB Chapter (CPAWS NB) is eager to support our government to put nature conservation at the forefront of our nation building.
CPAWS NB has a three-point plan for how the provincial government can do this. First, New Brunswick should commit to a new action plan to have at least 10 per cent of the province in legally protected natural areas and nature-oriented parks.
This would bring us up to the national average, and be more comparable to the action plans of all the other provinces.
We need a road map showing how New Brunswick will contribute to the nation-wide targets. We should focus not only on quantity, but also on the quality of protection. Our province’s researchers already have the information to identify the right areas for protection of nature, and the right ways to protect them.
Second, the New Brunswick government should work with the federal government to create protected areas around key coastal habitats. This could include some mud flat habitats that are vital stopovers for hungry migrating shorebirds. It could include ocean waters that surround protected island nature reserves, or inter-tidal zones next to coastal parks, like Fundy National Park.
Third, the province could step up the protection of remaining old forest habitats on Crown land.
They could give protected natural area status to ecologically rich wetlands, lakes and river headwaters. Most of the old forest habitats on Crown land remain open to all kinds of industrial development. This puts at risk these forests’ ability to be resilient to climate change impacts, and to continue providing us with flood protection or habitat for pollinators.
We have an opportunity to protect a special ecotourism gem in the Restigouche region. It’s already known for its salmon angling and canoeing. However, industrial development is eating away at these wild forests and rivers year by year. We could create a world-class wilderness tourism destination – the Restigouche Wilderness Waterway – a wide protected corridor along the river, on Crown land. It would help protect the million-dollar salmon angling economy. If we conserve this area’s special nature, promising ecotourism businesses could reliably promote a quality wilderness destination around the world.
CPAWS NB, our volunteers, partners and supporters stand ready to help our province achieve this goal. On Canada’s 150th anniversary of Confederation, there could be no better gift than well-protected nature – the iconic symbol of our cultures. As the climate changes, protecting natural areas is even more important, because the habitat we save might be our own.
ROBERTA CLOWATER is executive director of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society – New Brunswick Chapter, in Fredericton.
The oceans around New Brunswick influence our culture, contribute to our economic well-being and continue to shape our natural environment. The world recognizes the Bay of Fundy for its natural riches. From the world’s highest tides, to concentrations of endangered whales and coastal stopovers for migratory sandpipers, it has been in the running alongside the world’s natural wonders. The Gulf of St. Lawrence supports some of the richest fish and shellfish spawning and feeding grounds in Canada. Together, our ocean waters support over 7,000 tourism and recreation jobs, and over 11,000 jobs in fishing and seafood processing in New Brunswick.
These important values depend upon a resilient and robust ocean system. However, industrial uses in our oceans are expanding. We are faced with proposals for more crude oil tanker traffic, large open-net salmon aquaculture sites, oil and gas exploration, tidal turbines, and a proposed underwater cable across the Bay of Fundy to transport power from New Brunswick to Massachusetts. We are already feeling the effects of climate change, including changes to locations or amounts of whales, seabirds, fish, and the tiniest zooplankton at the bottom of the food chain. Too often, the health of our oceans is out of sight (under the water), and out of mind. We haven’t established the ocean protection measures to minimize those risks.
We need to balance these risks with the insurance policy that comes from establishing marine protected areas (also called MPAs). These are places in the ocean that government legally designates for conservation purposes. Places where we minimize human impacts in the ocean to ensure we can maintain the natural environment well into the future. MPAs provide long-term protection for the sea floor and the water column all the way to the surface, along with the wildlife that live in or swim through that area. Usually, MPAs would not permit industrial activities and construction that damage the sea bottom, and would restrict some kinds of fishing.
Governments and ocean stakeholders around the world recognize MPAs as an effective tool for helping to sustain ocean health and local economies. Studies show that fish populations in MPAs thrive, and can spillover to enhance fisheries outside MPAs. Marine protected areas can help safeguard the natural areas that local tourism businesses need, and that international tourists want to experience.
Many sites in the oceans around New Brunswick are sensitive or highly valuable natural spaces. Whales and basking sharks come to feed and congregate in the deep waters of the outer Bay of Fundy. Concentrations of mussel reefs, corals, kelp forests and sponge clusters act like“ecosystem engineers” and provide refuge for all kinds of fish, sea squirts, jellyfish and anemones. In the inner Bay of Fundy, vast mudflats create the right habitat that allows 80 per cent of the world’s semipalmated sandpipers to feed on mud shrimp and rest during their fall migration. All of these functions, and more, need to be included in networks of MPAs along both coasts.
As part of global efforts to help conserve our oceans, the federal government has committed to significantly increasing Canada’s marine protected areas. We are committed to protecting 10 per cent of Canada’s oceans by 2020, and we are now at less than one per cent. The ocean waters around New Brunswick only have less than half of one per cent in marine protected areas. The Department of Fisheries, Oceans and the Coast Guard and the Department of Environment and Climate Change are identifying potential candidates for the Bay of Fundy and the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
The federal and provincial governments will need to work together to ensure that the oceans around New Brunswick receive the conservation action we need. For the most effective solution, we will all have to co-operate – business owners, the fishing community, conservation groups, and citizens. The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society – New Brunswick Chapter is eager to work with all stakeholders and the public to make sure MPAs are established in an open way, and using strong objectives for ocean habitat protection. Plans are in the early stages.
If we do this right, marine protected areas will forever protect special places in our sea, restore and sustain healthy oceans and maintain vital ocean-based economies.
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The above article was published in The Daily Gleaner on Feb. 4, 2017.
Some examples include:
In New Brunswick, we need:
A world-class destination for ecotourism, outdoor adventures, and angling, with plenty of economic tourism potential yet untapped.