Environment Committee on Nov. 7th, 2013

[Chris Forbes]

Tony can add more, but for example, the commissioner did ask us for more precision in some of the targets we use. We got this comment from him in June, and we went back over the summer with our partner departments and worked on targets to see where we could add more detail to those targets, more precision. As an example of one we changed based on those discussions, there's a target on outdoor air pollutants, which had a high-level statement about objectives for air pollutants. We've made it a bit more precise, to link it to the air quality management system that's under way with the provinces, and put a timeframe on the objective for the target.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

That's good. I'm glad to know you've been responding vigorously to the commissioner's recommendations.

Do I have any more time?

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

You have about 40 seconds.

[Stephen Woodworth, Conservative, Kitchener Centre, ON]

I think 40 seconds are not enough time for me to clear my throat.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Okay. We're going to move, then, to Madame Freeman.

Go ahead, Madame Freeman.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Thank you.

Well, I'm very glad to be here. As the members of the committee know, I'm brand new to this file. It's lovely to be able to question department officials from the beginning and maybe get some information.

I'm going to start with parks, Mr. Prosper.

I'm really proud, as a Canadian, of our national parks. I don't want to ever suggest the contrary. But we're going to talk about what the commissioner did, so there are going to be some critical questions.

But that being said, they create 33,000 jobs in neighbouring communities and related industries, and every dollar spent by the federal government brings back $6. Is that correct?

[Rob Prosper]

Yes, that's correct.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

All right, that's great.

So I think we should be proud of Parks Canada and we should be supporting Parks Canada.

The Commissioner rightly said that “despite Parks Canada's significant efforts in many areas, the agency is struggling to protect ecosystems in Canada's national parks”. He added: “the agency has yet to assess the condition of 41% of the national parks' ecosystems, and a third of those it has assessed are in decline”.

Given those comments, why has Parks Canada still not yet assessed 41% of its parks? What is the schedule for correcting this delay?

[Rob Prosper]

Thank you very much for the question.

Thank you, Chair.

The way I would respond to that question is that, in fact, if Parks Canada had a fully populated monitoring program in place, it would be measuring or assessing the condition of 120 ecosystems. We have assessed the condition of 102 of those ecosystems. Of those, 94 ecosystems are either in fair or good condition. Of the 102 ecosystems, there are 21 that we've identified as declining. They're declining in a context where Parks Canada actually has the abilities to make a difference. So in those declining ecosystems, this is where we are targeting our ecological restoration efforts.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

The resources have been significantly reduced. Does that have an effect on the number of assessments that can be done? Are the present resources enough to react to the reduction, as you have just told me they are?

[Rob Prosper]

Thank you, Chair. Thank you for the question.

I think it's important for the committee to understand that Parks Canada's ecological integrity monitoring program has been evolving over the course of the last number of years from primarily a development program to an implementation program.

For example, in our ecological monitoring program we had to develop scientifically credible measures and indicators in all these ecosystems. That took a certain type of capacity. We have now moved into an implementation phase where our focus is on making tangible conservation gains on the ground. Of course, that takes a slightly different organizational set-up to accomplish.

As for the recommendations the Auditor General's office made on what they would like to see as priorities, we agree with those priorities. We agree with completing the implementation of our monitoring program, for example. Parks Canada feels it's got the right organization linked to the task at hand now.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

The Commissioner even said that there is no plan to combat the deterioration of 34% of the ecosystems in the parks.

How can you believe that you will be able to put plans into action? Are plans being established? Why is there a delay there too?

[Rob Prosper]

Again, I have a very similar answer to the question. We have 120 ecosystems that we are assessing at this point. A fully populated program has us assessing 120 ecosystems.

We feel we have the right organization to undertake that. We are in transition from development to implementation, so it is taking us some time. I don't want to give the impression that it's fully developed at this point. There is still work to do, and we think we are equipped to do it.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

I'll then ask specifically about the following. Parks Canada responded to the commissioner's recommendation to perform a capacity analysis in light of recent resource reductions by stating that it had already ensured that the capacity within the new organizational model for the resource conservation function was aligned to meet Parks Canada's conservation priorities.

So how did the agency perform its analysis to ensure its capacity was sufficient?

[Rob Prosper]

Sorry, I didn't quite answer your question the first time. I'll do so now.

We recognized in advance the fact that we were going through this transition into an implementation phase. So we did a review of the resource conservation function and looked at every park to identify what we needed in terms of capacity to fulfill the priority ecological integrity actions that we wanted to take. So we developed organizational models that ensured we had ecologists, the science technicians, and geomatics specialists present at every park so that the base capacity exists. In addition to that, we ensured that we had a team of senior scientists in a variety of different disciplines, like the veterinary discipline in restoration and in environmental assessment, to make sure we had senior science capacity available to support those field-level scientists.

[The Chair, Conservative, Harold Albrecht]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Madam Freeman.

We are moving now to Mr. Lunney for seven minutes, please.

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

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you for being here with us today for this important discussion.

I want to follow up with the parks assessment as well. I felt the commissioner's report leaned a little bit on the negative side and failed to acknowledge a lot of accomplishments that Parks Canada has made.

I'm glad to see in your report that you highlighted some of the positive comments that he made, including that “The Agency had carried out significant work in every area examined” and that the “Agency has undertaken the most intensive ecological restoration effort in its history.”

I think that in recognizing you're dealing with a huge expansion in national park terrain, there are capacity issues that have to be addressed.

I'm also highlighting your points here about scientifically assessing the condition of 102 ecosystems; that we're the only country in the G-8 that actually reports on the ecological integrity of our parks system; and that we are leading the world in restoration science and putting it into practice.

I just want to comment on that because I feel, as I said, the report was perhaps unnecessarily negative. Of course, there is a lot more that could be done. There is a gap in knowledge because of the expansion.

On the west coast, I have one of our premier parks, the Pacific Rim National Park, and somewhere in your remarks I heard something about technological information and technology that you're using to help reach out to a new generation of Canadians. The new Kwisitis Interpretive Centre on Long Beach is amazing in the way it shows the traditional knowledge of aboriginal people. Some people felt that the anatomical display was a little too anatomically correct, but that was first-nations directed. Of course, we've made some modest modifications to that. But there are the dune restorations that have been going on in the park. I see tremendous work happening right on the ground that we were able to participate in.

I want to ask you to comment on the habitat stewardship program, the aboriginal fund for species at risk, and the over 3,000 projects in the past 14 years. Can you identify some of the accomplishments that are happening through these great investments?

[Robert McLean, Executive Director, Wildlife Program Policy, Department of the Environment]

Thank you.

We've invested a significant amount of funding through the habitat stewardship program and the aboriginal fund for species at risk. We have 2,400 projects on the ground through the first program, and another nearly 800 projects through the aboriginal fund for species at risk.

Examples of the projects include addressing invasive alien species. There's a unique habitat type in Ontario called an alvar community. Through the funding, people are addressing and removing the species at risk in those areas. So, too, a first nation in Ontario is removing the invasive Scotch pine to address the needs of a species at risk plant.

Significantly, I think there have been a couple of landscape-level management plans that have been produced through the funding. One relates to the threatened woodland caribou. It's a landscape-level plan to manage that threatened species in Manitoba. A second example is the endangered Peary caribou in northern communities. So there's a landscape-level plan to provide the habitat and other needs of those species.

I could talk at length about the number of projects that are happening, but there are literally thousands of projects that are making a meaningful difference for those species at risk.

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

That's across the country.

[Robert McLean]

Yes.

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

Thank you for that.

I actually didn't mean to cut Parks Canada out of the discussion there. I was hoping you'd have a comment on the very successful work that you're doing in the parks.

[Rob Prosper]

Yes, I do.

Because you mentioned the stewardship program, I handed it over to my colleague, but you're absolutely right that we are doing some amazing work on species at risk. In fact, Parks Canada is the lead for 76 species, and we have 97% of our recovery strategies posted. So we are making excellent progress. We've now moved into the action planning process, which is the next step in the SARA cycle.

Just as an example, we've reintroduced black-footed ferrets into grasslands. This is a species that was not only extirpated, but was also thought to be extinct. We worked with a huge number of partners, including partners in the U.S. who found a very small remnant population in, I believe, Colorado. We've worked with a number of partners to reintroduce that species into grasslands, and we now have a breeding population of black-footed ferrets in grasslands.

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

That's great.

The other thing I wanted to comment on is the use of wildfire, because for years we suppressed fires. We had a nasty experience in British Columbia recently in Kelowna, an urban setting, not related to the park. But if we suppress all fires, we put systems at risk.

I notice that you've done some very successful work in using wildfires. It certainly was the tradition on Vancouver Island. I've heard stories about the first nations moving down island and that they used to set fires behind them to clear the brush and open things up for the next season.

Could you please comment on the use of fire?

[Rob Prosper]

Yes, we have a very active fire-management program, and I think in terms of the utilization of fire to make ecological gains, we're probably leading in the world in that area. We have a number of areas where we're putting fire back onto the landscape in order to create the natural habitat. Part of ecological integrity is making sure that the processes are in place on the ground, that those natural processes continue. We're doing that in parks across the country that have fire-dependent ecosystems.

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

That's great.

I saw something to do with the bison in northern Saskatchewan, which is pretty significant and important.

Thank you for that.