Environment Committee on March 26th, 2013

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

When you talked about the North American waterfowl management plan, you said that partnerships called habitat joint ventures set priorities and guide investments. Can you give some examples in Canada of those kinds of joint ventures and how they've been successful, or not?

[Robert McLean]

They're very successful. At the largest scale, we have the Eastern Habitat Joint Venture, with individual habitat joint ventures within that umbrella. The largest habitat joint venture we have is the Prairie Habitat Joint Venture in the three prairie provinces. We have the Canadian Intermountain Joint Venture, and the Pacific Coast Joint Venture is a joint initiative with our colleagues in the United States. Those are the four joint ventures we have.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

I know you will agree me that water plays an extremely important role in habitat and the working of water on land. It goes into streams and rivers and so forth. It's integrated. When you're dealing with a habitat stewardship program or other programs, to what degree do you coordinate with other departments in stewardship work that relates to water and rivers?

[Robert McLean]

The habitat stewardship program is a federal one. It's implemented jointly with the Parks Canada agency and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. Regionally, we also bring in our provincial colleagues. It's very closely coordinated with provincial programming.

As to your previous question about the success of the North American waterfowl management plan, I have some numbers. The overall investment since 1986 is $1.9 billion, 49% of which has come from the United States, with 51% from Canadian sources, including the federal government.

Money is one thing, but what's the conservation result on the ground in terms of millions of acres? I am switching to acres because a key audience for us is the United States. They have sent nearly $1 billion to Canada since 1990, and we like to communicate with them in terms they understand. We've secured 19.8 million acres of wetland in associated upland habitat under the North American waterfowl management plan, and we've influenced an additional 103.7 million acres of wetland and associated upland habitats. That's a very significant outcome. I think the North American waterfowl management plan is viewed as the best of the best. And not only in North America: I've had the opportunity to travel internationally and I know that others are jealous of what we've done in North America with that plan.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you, Mr. Regan. Your time is up.

I noted, Mr. McLean, that the 49% to 51% didn't include anything from Mexico, though you've identified it as one of the partners. That's just a side comment.

Mr. Choquette.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here to enlighten us on these questions.

I have a question on the people or groups who participate in the national conservation plan. I would like to know who these groups are. Can you tell me if there are NGOs or first nations, like the Métis or Inuit?

In your consultations on habitat protection, are there some that focused specifically on climate change? It could be on the mitigation of climate change or the fight against climate change in relation with changes in the ecosystem. What do you expect from those groups? What are their positions on the impact of climate change?

[Robert McLean]

With respect to your first question around the non-government organizations that are involved, I've mentioned a couple of the national ones. There are many. There are dozens and hundreds at that community scale that really make a difference in terms of delivering habitat conservation. I don't have that full list of organizations, but they would be well known in Quebec and in the other jurisdictions.

With respect to aboriginal people, I didn't mention in my remarks another program we have: the aboriginal fund for species at risk. We work very closely. It's a contribution program of about $3.3 million that's focused specifically on habitats that are important for species on aboriginal lands. I should add that aboriginal organizations also receive funding from the habitat stewardship program, so it's not limited to the $3.3 million.

With respect to climate change, it needs to be thought about and factored into the conservation planning that is happening. There are some examples, I think, where provincial jurisdictions.... I should have mentioned much earlier that habitat conservation really is going to be more in the domain of provincial and territorial jurisdictions, which are responsible for land use and land management much more than the federal government is.

The Province of Saskatchewan has a wonderful initiative under way on connectivity and biodiversity within Saskatchewan and is attempting to develop a plan that would identify, I believe, more than 3,000 hectares of habitat. It's designing connectivity on the landscape so that the ecosystems there can adapt, self-adapt, to a changing climate. I think that's one of the important aspects of habitat conservation: beginning to build resiliency, which is the term people use, into ecosystems, so that Canadian ecosystems can adapt and respond to changing conditions.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Mr. McLean, if I understand what you are saying correctly, you have a very reduced, if not non-existent, role in the fight against climate change. The provinces and the territories are fighting climate change or working on what you call resilience. Have I understood correctly?

[Michelle Rempel, Calgary Centre-North, CPC]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, I appreciate my colleague's line of questioning. I just think it needs to be contextualized within the scope of the study. I feel the way that last question was phrased was perhaps out of scope and could be focused a bit more specifically around the scope of the study.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you, Ms. Rempel.

I would draw attention to the scope of the study. We're discussing habitat conservation, not climate change.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Of course, I will therefore ask a question related to habitat conservation and stakeholders. I think it is the first or second point of the study.

Do those stakeholders communicate with you about climate change? You talked about the provinces, but you represent Environment Canada and Parks Canada. How do those stakeholders communicate with you about climate change and the role you should play?

[Rob Prosper]

Perhaps I could provide some input here. I'm sure the committee has heard that Parks Canada has made pretty significant gains in terms of park establishments since 2006 and has taken actions to lead to the protection of almost 150,000 square kilometres. I can tell you, without any hesitation, that those gains would not have happened without an excellent relationship with aboriginal communities.

We are in very close contact with the first nations and aboriginal people of Canada in developing those national parks. They simply would not be there without having that involvement. We communicate on a regular basis, to a degree that we have cooperative management arrangements for those parks. That cooperation is on a daily basis.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you, Mr. Prosper.

Mr. Choquette, your time is up.

Mr. McLean, do you want to add to that at all, for just 30 seconds?

[Robert McLean]

Yes, very quickly, just on habitat, groups don't come to us and speak specifically about climate change. I think people working locally recognize that habitat conservation is one of the key strategies to adapt. The federal government has other programs, which I'm not familiar with, that are addressing climate change more generally. My comment was very specific on habitat conservation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you, Mr. McLean.

Ms. Rempel, for five minutes, please.

[Michelle Rempel]

Thank you, and thank you again to the witnesses for coming today.

I wanted to pick up on some of the comments that were made around Mr. Regan's line of questioning. Part of what we're looking at in this study is best practices. Mr. McLean, you made a comment, and I'm paraphrasing, that habitat doesn't provide for only one species. I know we've talked before at this committee about a whole ecosystem approach to looking at species management, recovery strategies, and whatnot. I was wondering if you could speak a little first to some of the principles that would be used to develop best practices in looking at recovering a species or a set of species and ecosystems, some of what Mr. Regan was saying, and adding to that. In your notes, you were talking about:

The North American Waterfowl Management Plan (NAWMP) is a continental effort to conserve sufficient wetland and associated uplands habitats to sustain healthy populations....

Could you talk a bit about some of those best practices you use in determining how habitat stewardship is used to recover a species?

[Robert McLean]

With respect to the first part of your question, I can respond with an example. We at Environment Canada have been working with our colleagues in the province of Saskatchewan, as well as with industry sectors, cattlemen's associations, and so on, in southwestern Saskatchewan, to develop a multi-species initiative that's called South of the Divide. What's key there is taking the time to work with landowners to identify the habitats that are important for a species, and then the agricultural producers can see where the lands are that they will be using. The point I've made already is that sometimes those are the same lands: ranching is using native prairie.

I forgot the second part of your question, and I apologize.

[Michelle Rempel]

That's okay.

To follow up on that, when you're talking with groups, they're the land users of affected lands, and you're looking at species recovery. Are you also looking at the integrity of the working landscape, socio-economic principles, those sorts of things? How do you integrate that whole land usage component into a species recovery strategy?

[Robert McLean]

I was going to integrate it more and use the North American waterfowl management plan as an example, because that human dimension is at its heart. That plan, incidentally, was updated last year to address the hugely important human dimension part of conservation. How does that human dimension get translated on the landscape? Again, it's working with landowners and coming to some of those practical techniques.

If you want more waterfowl, there's something called dense nesting cover. If predators are taking the eggs of those ground-nesting birds, then you don't get the outcomes. The plan would increase dense nesting cover to protect waterfowl from predation. I already mentioned rotational grazing; that's working positively and constructively with the landowner to maintain the economic outcome while achieving conservation outcomes.

Zero-tillage grazing was initiated by the North American waterfowl management plan and others; it's a key tool. There's something called a flushing bar if a farmer is haying. That's a bar that you put in front of the machine that's cutting the hay that scares any wildlife, not just birds, but fawns, and so on, so there are a number of tools, all of which are developed and used cooperatively with the landowner.

[Michelle Rempel]

One of the other principles you mentioned in response to Mr. Regan's question was looking at the outcomes of the habitat. Could you expand on that a little more and talk about some of the outcomes you would consider, both in terms of species management as well as in habitat conservation?

[Robert McLean]

Yes. I will go back to the South of the Divide initiative. That's a multi-species approach, and I think as the habitat conservation plan is finalized and we see implementation, we'll see multiple species benefiting, because the plan is designed to maintain the full suite of habitats, if you will, to keep species populations at that designed level. Really important in the concept is monitoring over time, because perhaps the plan doesn't deliver the outcomes, whether economic or conservation. Then that partnership can come together to figure out what needs to change to improve the outcomes.

[Michelle Rempel]

Great.

I'll close off. Mr. Prosper, you spoke about the need to ensure that we have adequate consultation whenever we're developing habitat management plans, etc. I live close to Banff National Park, where I know we've got a bunch of species reintroduction programs under way. I'm intimately familiar with them, but could you give the committee some examples of the consultation processes with local land users and whatnot on developing the management plan.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

In the interest of time, could you give us one example? Thank you.

[Rob Prosper]

Perhaps it's not directly related to a reintroduction or a wildlife species, but the management planning process is the key document that guides the management of these protected areas for a period of ten years. All of these management plans in national parks are developed through a very vigorous public consultation process, so this document is at the heart of our management.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you, Mr. Prosper.

Thank you, Ms. Rempel.

We'll move to Ms. Leslie for five minutes, please.