Environment Committee on April 30th, 2013

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Megan Leslie]

You have almost one minute.

[François Pilon, NDP, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Since I have almost one minute, I will continue. I will be brief.

Mr. Lowe, each year, your organization gives an environmental stewardship award to a cattle producer whose conservation practices exceed standards. Can you tell us a bit about the person who won the prize this year?

[Bob Lowe]

Christoph Weder was Alberta's nomination, I guess you'd call it. I'm not sure what you want to know. He's taken an area in northern Alberta, and as with all of them, our qualifications are not necessarily what's happening now but the improvement that's happened over a course of years, how the improvement has come. Christoph basically won because, of the nominations we had, he proved to be the most environmentally sustainable manager.

[Fawn Jackson]

They did a species assessment and had something like 130 different birds on their property. There's an enormous amount of conservation for habitat on those ranches.

Thanks for the question.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Megan Leslie]

Thanks very much. That's impressive.

We'll move on to Mr. Lunney.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thanks to all of our witnesses for being with us today.

I want to start with the Grand River. After 75 years, it's the oldest of the 36 conservation areas in Ontario. Recently, according to your testimony, it was named a national heritage river. I want to say congratulations. This is a very effective working model with the Grand River Conservation Authority.

I lived in the area for 15 years, but I've been gone from the area now for more than 20 years. I want to comment that in those days the Grand had already had such an amazing recovery. Canoeing on the Grand is a very popular pastime now. It's another world when you get down in the water and travel along that corridor.

So I've been away for more than 20 years. What are the challenges facing the Grand today?

[Joe Farwell]

The challenges facing the Grand are many. We're addressing them through a water management plan, working with our municipalities. The challenge, I would say, is intensification. Certainly there's an awful lot of urban development, and with all of the sewage that gets treated and then the effluent that's put into the river, it becomes extremely challenging for the river to assimilate that. Our municipalities are doing great wonders spending on upgrades to the sewage treatment plants. We need to continue to work with the farm community to minimize the amount of nutrients that run off into the streams. We have a really strong working relationship with them, so we remain optimistic about that.

One of the things we're facing at the Grand right now—I think across the country you'll see this—is this really radical climate shifting that seems to be going on. We go from very dry periods, like last year, to very wet periods. It becomes a challenge when you have a managed system like the Grand and only so much reservoir space to take the spring runoff and only so much water to dole out over the summer. The Grand is a highly managed system. The snow is collected through runoff into the reservoirs and discharged over the summer, so it's not just sewage treatment plant effluent discharged in the Grand.

I would say the big challenge for the river is the intensification and the shifting climate.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Thanks for that. Maintaining water levels and flow levels is going to be an ongoing challenge.

My colleagues have already worked through the effective model you have with a small amount of money over a long period of time, over a decade. The $34 million is a substantial amount, but there are 5,000 water protection projects and the total of the grants amounted to $13 million with farmers contributing. There's the partnership thing again. Because of the longevity and the hard work that's been going into this, you have buy-in from the community and that word “partnership”, that's sustainable. We're hearing that as a very effective model.

Mary Granskou, you used that language about creative partnerships as well. You had a tremendous group of people come together with the Canadian Boreal Initiative, a wide spectrum of people coming together to create the coalition and the agreement. What does that look like now? Do these partners still get together on a regular basis to discuss issues or is it institutional management that's carrying on the vision that was created initially?

[Mary Granskou]

Thanks for your question.

The way it's implemented is that there are meetings twice a year, and we're continually looking at renewing the membership. Each of the members has their own action plan that covers their own area, field of work, whether it's a company, a community, or an NGO. They're now moving to a funding model where they want to initiate projects that they can get behind in very specific terms. So we're continuing to evolve, because if you don't evolve you're going to lose interest and support. So we're continually doing that, including where the sectors are that we don't have membership for.

For instance, in British Columbia, very key is the mining sector. So we have very active dialogue on that question, for instance.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

You have a huge area with a small population. I think active engagement is going to be an ongoing necessity.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Megan Leslie]

We'll end on that point.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

I was just getting to a really good question.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Megan Leslie]

Five minutes is short. Perhaps one of your colleagues can ask your question for you.

Monsieur Choquette.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses.

I would like to raise something. Perhaps it escaped me, but I have not heard about climate change yet. Last week, in the House, the NDP presented a motion on climate change, which was voted on yesterday. I think this aspect is very important. If our national habitat conservation plan does not talk about climate change, the plan will not be effective.

Unfortunately, in five minutes, I don't have much time to talk about it, but I did want to say that it is very important to tackle climate change.

In this regard, Ms. Granskou, you mentioned that in 2007, I think, 1,500 scientists from all over the world expressed their support for the goals of the Boreal Forest Conservation Framework. Could you remind us a bit of what those goals were, and tell us if they are on their way to being achieved? Could the federal government do things to accelerate or facilitate the achievement of the goals of the Boreal Forest Conservation Framework?

[Mary Granskou]

Thank you very much.

They have advanced significantly. For instance, in the provinces, several provinces have stepped forward to really embrace the vision of advancing, with a stewardship model, the goals to sustainably develop approximately half of the landscape, and to look at conservation regimes in the other half. One of the drivers, actually, is this change in climate because we're going to need to manage in a forward-looking way with very dynamic solutions over very large areas, if we're going to preserve jobs, the economy, and species.

Quebec is a great example. They have their Plan Nord. It's a very serious initiative launched by Premier Charest. It is now into the government of Madame Marois, so they've preserved the initiative. They're reframing it. They're continually developing initiatives within it that are going to advance the goals in very serious terms.

So you really can't get more serious than that, than a jurisdiction that takes it on. I'm sorry, I'm probably over time here, but how can the federal government provide support? I think number one is to support land use planning. I would put that at the very forefront of what the federal government can do right now.

Thank you.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Would that be your main recommendation?

[Mary Granskou]

Yes.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

That's great, thank you very much.

In this respect, I would like to come back on important tools for species conservation. I think you talked about that in your third recommendation. You spoke first of the stability of the Species At Risk Act. That act should therefore not be reopened, right?

[Mary Granskou]

Yes, what we're saying there is that we need time. For instance, a number of provinces are in very advanced stages of action planning for different species. There are collaborative tables under way. I'll give an example in Quebec. You know a number of the northern first nation leaders are getting together around what a collaborative strategy would look like across our nations. It's very historic, what's happening there.

You have other places where agreements are starting to crystallize to be able to advance, in concrete terms, action plans in their region. All we're saying is to allow for that implementation. That's really our core point there.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Very well.

You also talked about environmental assessments. Of course, here we had the misfortune of seeing the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act be in part distorted. In addition, some of its strength was taken away, to the point that it does not allow for proper project assessment or appropriate consultations.

You represent several groups, including first nations. That shows the importance of what a good environmental assessment should do. It means sitting down with the groups concerned and implementing something that would be good for everyone.

Is that also what you would recommend for having good environmental assessments?

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Megan Leslie]

I'd ask for a quick answer because we're out of time.

[Mary Granskou]

Just briefly, I would say that what's vitally important is to ensure that whatever assessments are done with provinces are the right solutions—important now more than ever.

[The Vice-Chair, NDP, Megan Leslie]

Mr. Storseth, it's all yours.

[Brian Storseth, Conservative, Westlock—St. Paul, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair. May I say, you're a refreshing change in the chair.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!