Environment Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2018

[Dr. Javier Gracia-Garza]

Again, there's nothing I can give you in terms of figures, per se, when it comes to an organic system versus a traditional or conventional system. I think there clearly are fewer inputs in the case of inorganic fertilizers. Some of the nitrous oxides in other emissions associated with that will be part of this equation.

I would like to bring to your attention one of the comments made by my colleague Mr. Parry. We are launching, as a new initiative within Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, something that we are calling “living laboratories”. Within these living laboratories, we will be exploring key components. One of the two innovative pieces of what a living laboratory will be includes bringing a much more systematic approach to how all of these differing factors—soil, water, biodiversity, microbial—are interacting within agricultural systems. By looking at this more comprehensive approach, we can develop beneficial management practices that look at the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, better conservation of soil, the rebuilding of soils that are becoming degraded as a result of erosion or all sorts of issues, as well as water.

[Joe Peschisolido]

Will this program be all across the country, or will it just be in Ontario and Quebec, under your bailiwick?

[Dr. Javier Gracia-Garza]

It would be across the country. We are hoping to be establishing this in, I would say, a stack, not all at once.

As I mentioned, one innovative piece is the different components working as a system, but the second is about working in farm environments and with farmers to develop these beneficial management practices. We want the benefit of learning. Doing the research in a different way will be part of the benefit of learning, so deployment of these living laboratories across the country will be sequential. That's what we envision.

[Joe Peschisolido]

That's a good thing.

This is less of a question and more of a statement about what you've just outlined here. Kent Mullinix, head of sustainable agriculture at Kwantlen University in Richmond, is actually doing just that. That's just a point there.

I'd like to follow up with Mr. Lemprière. You started discussing the importance of wood—forests—on the sinks, as you've put it. Can you elaborate a little on that? In B.C., there are a lot of forests and quite a bit of wood.

[Tony Lemprière]

As the assistant deputy minister said, there are multiple aspects we need to look at when it comes to forests, the use of wood and contributing to climate change and emission reduction goals. There are things we can do in the forests, such as changing management practices, making efforts to restore or rehabilitate forests after things like the mountain pine beetle infestation or fires, other types of activities in the forests—fertilization and those sorts of things—and some of the things that have come up in previous comments and questions. We can make efforts to try to reduce fires and the risk from fire.

All those things could contribute and are tied in with how we use the wood. When we harvest, that has a big impact on the carbon in the forest, so we can look at what we do with that harvest—the carbon that comes out of the forest and is used in forest products—along the lines of some of the things I mentioned earlier. Of course, we can think about using waste wood for bioenergy, to replace fossil fuels. All those pieces are part of what we need to look at.

It's also part of a systems approach that we take when we think about mitigation and forests, so in any given possible action it's important to look at the impacts in the forest on wood use, bioenergy and so forth. We can look at all those things, and indeed we are expecting that the forest, how we manage it and how we use wood will be contributing to our 2030 emissions reduction target.

[Joe Peschisolido]

Thank you.

[The Chair]

Mr. Aboultaif, you have six minutes.

[Ziad Aboultaif]

First of all, thank you for appearing before committee. I have a report here showing the net carbon emissions in Canada's managed forest—all areas—between 1990 and 2016, which is 26 years. That report shows the emissions, and it seems like we had increases in 2005, 2006 and 2007. After that, it seems to be a consistent level. There were some drops from 2008 to 2013, and then since 2015 it's gone down again.

With 2.5 million hectares, it represents only about 1% of the total Canadian forestry as per the report. Can you explain, with 1% only, how much impact that has on emissions and what it means in budgetary terms to deal with that? How can we offset that balance somehow, if we have to deal with it?

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

Could you just please clarify what the 1% was that you were referring to? Did you mean 1% as the area burned by forest fires?

[Ziad Aboultaif]

Yes.

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

Basically, the question is, what can we do to reduce the emissions from forest fires? Is that correct?

[Ziad Aboultaif]

How many resources do we need to do that if we're only dealing with 1% of the total forested area in the country?

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

Yes, I appreciate that.

First of all, we have to appreciate where these fires occur, because most of these fires and most of the areas burned are caused by lightning, and much of it occurs in remote areas where we do not have the kind of infrastructure that is required to suppress forest fires effectively.

Secondly, if you go to southern California and witness what happened in recent days there, you see that even where you have high population density, road infrastructure, airports and all the fire suppression technology in the world, we're still facing situations where forest fires simply cannot be suppressed because of the intensity of the energy that is being released in these forest fires.

I'm the carbon guy. I'm not the fire expert, but what my fire experts say is that what has happened in recent years is that the conditions in the climate situation have increased the intensity of forest fires to the point that the fire suppression efforts are increasingly overwhelmed. It is, I would argue, not possible to increase the resources to the point that all forest fires can be suppressed. I should emphasize that British Columbia, for example, in the last four years has spent about $1.6 billion in fire suppression efforts. That is just at the provincial level. The numbers across the country are, again, in the range of $700 million or $800 million per year and probably more in some.

The big question, therefore, is this. Do we need to change our strategy as we face climate change impacts to start managing our forests in such a way as to reduce the risk of future fires rather than trying to spend more money on suppressing fires when they occur?

[Ziad Aboultaif]

Thank you for the answer. To build on that question, you're recommending not to spend any more resources, but if we—

[Dr. Werner Kurz]

I did not say that. I said that no matter how much you increase the resources, we will not be able to suppress all fires. That's what I said.

[Ziad Aboultaif]

Okay, but you didn't answer my question on the numbers. I can understand you probably don't have that amount, but I would say that, if more resources are needed to suppress more fires—let's put that argument in place—and we were able to achieve that goal somehow through this mechanism, would that give us any credit back on the Paris Agreement commitment?

[Beth MacNeil]

Werner, I think I'm going to take this.

Coming out of September's Canadian Council of Forest Ministers meeting—usually that's simply an information exchange session that happens annually with federal, provincial, and territorial ministers—there was a key action that came of it. My deputy minister, along with the deputy minister in British Columbia, were tasked to come up with a suite of priority actions that would be required to start to address the high magnitude and frequency of forest fires in Canada.

Do we have adequate resources? No, we don't. We're working with our federal and provincial partners. We've identified the priorities, and we're working with them to cost those. We're also working with Public Safety Canada on an emergency management strategy.

[Ziad Aboultaif]

Just to close on this, then, I'm here sitting and listening to both arguments. Even if we put in more resources, we're not going to make any huge difference beyond the causes of the fires. In the meantime, if we do so, you're still saying that we don't have enough resources and that even our strategy is not good enough to be able to cope with this problem.

[Beth MacNeil]

I would say we need more resources, and there are management practices that we can consider with our provincial and territorial colleagues. I can't make the assumption that it will reduce forest fire frequency to zero.

[Ziad Aboultaif]

Thank you.

[The Chair]

Mr. Bossio, we move over to you.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, all, so much for being here today and for your patience. We really do appreciate it.

I wanted to delve into this aspect, as well, a little bit. Is it not the case that forests are not considered in our Paris numbers because of the cyclical nature of absorbing and then expending carbon by trees, period? Yes, they do absorb carbon, but when they die, that carbon is then released. Is it not just because of the cyclical nature of our forests that they are not considered right now, as far as meeting our climate targets is concerned?

[Beth MacNeil]

Thank you.

Tony, can I let you finish what you started about an hour ago in terms of...?

I think it will answer your question in terms of the net sink and how Canada is going to go forward in the accounting under the international regime.

[Tony Lemprière]

Under the Paris Agreement, countries can, and indeed are encouraged to, use their land sectors, including their forests, in achieving their emission reduction targets, and Canada is going to do the same. You're right that forest stands have cycles, but we are looking at the entirety of the managed forest, which I think was said earlier is a large area. It's 226 million hectares. We're looking at the entirety of the managed forest and the impacts of human activity on that. We are planning to include that in working towards the 2030 target.

Right now, or for the latest year for which we have information, which is 2016, the managed forest and harvested wood products together were a sink of I think it was 27 megatonnes. What we need to look at is how we can change management practices, how we can use more wood, how we can use wood for bioenergy, how we can do things like reduce the risk from fire, how all of those types of things can increase carbon sequestration and reduce emissions. It's the impacts of those types of actions that we can then use in working towards the 2030 emission reduction target that we have under the Paris Agreement.

[Mike Bossio, Liberal, Hastings—Lennox and Addington, ON]

Do you know how much of our forests are harvested on an annual basis right now?