Thank you, Jim.
Good morning.
Considering the environmental challenges and market pressures facing the sector, we believe there is a compelling need for an agri-environmental vision supported by policy leadership and intergovernmental collaboration.
The next APF should be supported by sound legislative frameworks and consistent across other provincial and federal policy objectives, including the one on wetlands. In this spirit, Ducks Unlimited Canada recommends that programs and tools of the next framework fully support the current federal wetland policy.
At a minimum, these programs should not encourage or enable land use decisions that conflict with that policy. Without this alignment, it will be very difficult to achieve tangible landscape-scale results on issues such as habitat loss, water quality, climate change, and biodiversity.
In our experience with Growing Forward 2, the impact of beneficial management practices, or BMPs, is highest in jurisdictions that have strong wetland policies and other environmental legislative frameworks. A good example of this would be Atlantic Canada. Conversely, in areas without these supporting frameworks, habitat and associated EGS losses from unregulated or unlawful habitat destruction dwarfed the perennial cover and wetlands that were restored via BMPs.
In terms of direct programming, we believe that the next APF should build on Growing Forward 2 by developing and enhancing programs that incentivize and reward environmental stewardship and BMPs on agricultural land.
Currently there is a suite of programs that provide producers with cost-shared funding to implement a variety of BMPs that can help farms become more environmentally sustainable while increasing profitability. While cost-sharing may be an appropriate mechanism to encourage on-farm improvements that generate high benefits to the producer relative to cost—an example of this would be improving fertilizer storage on-farm—this type of program has not been as effective at incentivizing BMPs of high environmental value, such as wetland restoration. To increase uptake of such BMPs, we recommend that the next APF facilitate the development and implementation of programs that compensate producers for the habitat and EGS they restore.
Further to this, DU recommends that the principle of additionality be firmly embedded in the new APF and corresponding BMP programming. Under this principle, incentives and compensation would only be provided for activities that deliver environmental gains over and above what's occurring under the status quo, or business as usual.
With respect to the actual BMP program implementation, we encourage government to leverage and maximize delivery partnerships and badly needed resources so that they appeal to farms of all sizes. We believe that simplifying the application process and providing increased support to producers should help increase program uptake.
We also recommend the re-establishment of a landscape-scale perennial cover restoration program like Greencover Canada, which ran from 2003 to 2008. Under that program, producers received financial assistance to establish hay and pasture on marginal land. This land use change generated many benefits, including reduced soil erosion, water quality protection, carbon capture and storage, and enhanced biodiversity.
Another tool that can help expand the environmental awareness and conservation ethic among producers is the environmental farm plan, or EFP. We fully support ongoing discussions on how the EFP can be used to help producers respond to domestic and international sustainability demands. To accomplish this, the EFP has to be strengthened by placing greater focus and support on areas of the farm that are not directly under production.