Environment Committee on May 30th, 2013

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I imagine that you keep track of and study the consequences or benefits of those stewardship efforts and voluntary conservation programs. Would that be correct?

[Rick Bates]

Yes.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Could you tell the committee what evidence you have accumulated on the benefits of the stewardship arrangements or voluntary conservation agreements that you have participated in?

[Rick Bates]

First of all, there's no doubt that voluntary stewardship can have a very positive effect. For both the Canadian Wildlife Federation and other conservation organizations I have been associated with, there's lots of evidence of that. The crux of the issue I think depends on how long and how important that particular piece of habitat may be.

Different tools are useful in different areas. Communication can help with some landowners. Different incentives work with different landowners, for example, financial incentives. Joint planning can help share values and help people become more committed. There's a wide range of potential stewardship tools. All work in some situations better than others.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Would it be safe to say that your organization would not be partnering in stewardship and conservation programs and projects unless you felt there was evidence that they could be successful?

[Rick Bates]

Correct.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

You don't operate without an evidence-based premise to go forward on, do you?

[Rick Bates]

Correct.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

All right. Thank you.

There may be a lack of a rigorous Canada-wide scientific database on these projects, but that shouldn't stop us from encouraging conservation and stewardship arrangements, should it?

[Rick Bates]

Correct.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I think you said there could be greater use of conservation agreements at the federal level. Is that correct?

[Rick Bates]

Yes.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I'm interested in hearing from you what obstacles you think are out there that might be preventing more use of conservation agreements at the federal level.

[Rick Bates]

James has all kinds of experience working in that area, and I think you'd be best served if he spoke on that.

[James Page, Manager, Species at Risk Program, Canadian Wildlife Federation]

In the context especially of private landowners, a major obstacle is just entering into a conservation agreement. Each individual landowner is likely not going to approach the government or work with a specific conservation agreement. So one thing we've suggested would work well is to have an umbrella organization, such as a farmers association, be able to be a third party and be able to deliver the conservation agreements to each individual landowner. Not only does this facilitate your landowners' being able to enter into it, but it also promotes compliance. One landowner won't as easily break the conditions of that agreement because they know that may result in the loss of the agreement for all their neighbouring landowners as well.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

That's very helpful. I would just observe that another benefit is that it would enable a more ecosystem-based approach, rather than having one-offs here and there.

I know that in Ontario, under the Endangered Species Act, 2007, there are provisions that allow people who enter into conservation agreements to be exempted from some of the prohibitions, where that's appropriate to do so.

Are you familiar with those provisions?

[James Page]

Yes.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

Are you aware that there are really no similar provisions in the federal legislation, the Species At Risk Act?

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Mr. Woodworth, your time is up.

I'll give you time to respond to that question, Mr. Page.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I wanted to ask whether you think that provision should be in the Species At Risk Act.

[James Page]

Well, in speaking with the people who developed the act, I would say it wasn't designed such that a section 11 conservation agreement would be tied to an exemption. Where it can fit, though, is that such a conservation agreement can be linked with permitting, and there can be a parallel process in that sense.

There was a first part of that question as well, I believe.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

We're out of time. If there's a chance, I'll come back.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

If you could respond to that, either in writing or later on, that would be great.

We may have a bit of time, but I don't think so—based on the committee's performance today.

I'm just trying to increase the love here.

Mr. Toet.

[Lawrence Toet, Conservative, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

At least I'm going to get my time. I'm appreciative of that.

I want to start with Mr. Hubert from the Forest Products Association of Canada.

We've heard quite a bit today about flexibility within regulation and the need for some flexibility. I think there's an example of that in my background, and I'm sure you'd be very familiar with it. It has to do with FSC. I was in the print communications business for many years before I came to Parliament. FSC is a great example of where flexibility.... I know it's not a government regulation, as such, but it was a body that created regulations, regulations that actually made it very hard to adapt.

An example of that was when they initially brought forward FSC certification, the paper that was made at the mill was kept separate at the mill, but the initial regulations forced the shipper of that product to actually ship it on separate vehicles. It had to be separated out into a separate train car. When it got to the warehouse at the paper house, they would actually have to store it in a completely separate warehouse from all the other paper in the warehouse. If I had a truck come into my printing company and I had fifteen skids of paper and five of them were FSC-certified skids and 10 of them were not, they would actually have to send two separate trucks out, because they couldn't contaminate the FSC product. Then when it got to my shop, I actually had to have a separate warehouse area for the FSC-certified papers so that they wouldn't be contaminated. They were all wrapped. They were all skidded. I don't think there were any bugs going back and forth between the papers.

But that was an adaptation that FSC made as we worked with it as printers. It made it very cost-prohibitive. It added a lot to the cost of the product. It made it very hard to sell to corporate Canada and corporate North America that this was a great alternative. It was coming from stewardship practices in the forest that are actually very good, but it added 25% to 40% to the cost of the product.

I wonder if you can comment on whether that adjustment has had a great effect. I know when we made those adjustments, when we talked to FSC and had those conversations and said that this was very prohibitive, that adjustment in regulation actually created a huge uptake in the use of FSC product.

Could you comment on that?

[Mark Hubert]

I'm familiar with the challenges of it.

It started with FSC, or FSC was a big part of it, and then chain of custody and product tracking became a conversation that has become part of the vernacular, so to speak, of all certification programs. It's to some extent being requested or demanded by the marketplace.

The challenges associated with it have been put to all of the certification standards. At the end of the day, we want to be able to highlight the fact that we are conserving habitat and doing the right thing for species, but not in a way that is so prescriptive that it makes costs go through the roof or that is just a process that feeds on itself. It's something that we're continuing to work on as an industry as we deal with each of the certification standards, and it's something that is germane to the conversation with respect to species at risk.

Certification still is a voluntary activity. Chain of custody is voluntary to the extent that it's not government legislated, but the parallels exist. We're working with organizations such as the voluntary standards organizations in a similar vein to the way that we would be thinking about the application of legislative pieces such as SARA.