Science and Research Committee on Feb. 9th, 2023

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chairman, and thanks to the witnesses for your appearance today at committee.

I want to start with the technology that both organizations referenced. There was the eBird app that was referenced, and then, Dr. Reynolds, you talked about your iNaturalist app, which I really would have liked to have had a couple of summers ago when I walked into some poison oak.

In the context of building capacity amongst the citizen science community, what kinds of investments should the federal government be looking at in terms of the technology that you're using, not just to build capacity within the organization but to better gather the information and better track the data?

Dr. Reynolds, I'll start with you and then I'll turn it over to Mr. Nadeau and Mr. Allair.

[Dr. John Reynolds]

When we had Canada's 150th anniversary, there was funding—I believe it was federal funding—to sponsor bioblitzes. These are community events where people go out to try to find and photograph as many plants and animals as possible in a given period of time, like a weekend or a day or whatever, and iNaturalist is the go-to app for reporting on these.

I think that was probably very successful. Certainly there were a lot of bioblitzes that came out of that, and that's a way to engage people who otherwise might not have ever heard of a bioblitz. They might be people who like to go hiking or they're casually interested in the birds they see, but to actually get them out there with like-minded people, I think that can be a very good way to get people into it, and in fact, right now, internationally there's something called the City Nature Challenge. that iNaturalist runs on a long weekend once a year, and they see a big uptake in people who sign up for the app from that.

I think that's one way you can get to the grassroots level.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Okay.

Monsieur Nadeau.

[Jody Allair]

I think investments in the infrastructure of these programs are obviously really key and at Birds Canada we have a variety of programs. We run 44 different citizen science programs and engage with about 74,000 volunteers every year, and in order to do that you do need proper infrastructure, everything from our database system, and we've got a very sophisticated database called NatureCounts. It's actually one of the largest biodiversity databases in the world. We house the data there. We have lots of training involved with all of our programs, whether they're structured or unstructured citizen science, aiming for that high data quality, which is obviously really important.

But all this takes funding and all this takes a lot of energy and a lot of expertise, to make sure not only are we providing the best experience for volunteers but also that we're collecting the best data to have the most impact on birds as possible.

[Patrick Nadeau]

I would just add that that's what we're getting at in our first recommendation when we speak of supporting the backbone infrastructures.

Just to give you an example, when these programs are successful and they're scaled, we're now talking about potentially thousands of Canadians who are participating in these programs. So imagine trying to maintain interactions and keep that many volunteers engaged. You need to have a back end that can actually automate some of these things or even just how do you send an email to 3,000 people to tell them when it's time to go monitor X species.

So that backbone infrastructure, oftentimes it's just an initial investment to set it up and then it can be used for many years and for many programs, but there is this behind the scenes work that needs to happen, especially if you're scaling these programs.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thanks for that.

I really liked your recommendation as it relates to access to federal lands. As a former conservation authority board member, I know there's a cost sometimes to visiting some of the best natural areas we have, whether they're in a municipality, a province or the country. I was very intrigued with your recommendation that suggests there be some support for federally managed sites. I think you could probably extend that to provincial areas, as well as local conservation authorities and parks.

Mr. Reynolds, on the recommendation that Birds Canada has provided, do you support that concept?

I read an article today in the local paper about the great backyard bird count that's coming for the Family Day weekend. I would use that as an example. If I was to suggest to my kids that we take some time out on Family Day to go out and undertake a count, there would be a cost for me to visit some local conservation authorities.

What role could the government play in reducing those costs and maybe breaking down some of the barriers that people have to natural areas?

I will ask that of you, Mr. Reynolds, and then I will go to Mr. Nadeau and Mr. Allair.

[Dr. John Reynolds]

For events like the great backyard bird count and the city nature challenge, which go on, these are generally not run at the federal level, although they could certainly benefit from federal funding. The way to reduce costs would be if there was some funding made available to make them happen. That is what happened during Canada's 150th anniversary. There was funding made available for people to do the organization and the advertising.

I don't know if people received...I don't think they were paying the participants per se, but they were certainly making it a lot easier for them to participate.

I'm not sure exactly what the barriers are that we're talking about for people getting access to lands. If I may clarify, are we talking about travel costs or camping? Is that the sort of concern?

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

It's the cost of getting into a park and covering your admission to whatever area we're talking about.

[Dr. John Reynolds]

I see. I haven't really thought about it, to be honest, but if a national park or a provincial park wanted to do a bioblitz to encourage a very large number of people to come there, I wonder whether there could be some sort of subsidy for camping fees, or something like that.

E.C. Manning Provincial Park in British Columbia, which is one of our most popular parks, has various annual events encouraging people to come, and it might be possible that there could be some sort of reduction in fees to participate in them. It's something I haven't really thought through.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Thank you, Dr. Reynolds.

We're now moving on to MP Blanchette-Joncas for six minutes.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to welcome the witnesses who are joining us for the second hour of this important meeting of the committee.

My first questions are for the representatives of Birds Canada.

Mr. Nadeau and Mr. Allair, thank you for being here in the room today.

Mr. Nadeau, I would like to commend your good track record when it comes to engagement. You have also created the largest network in the world of citizen scientists who take samples of microplastics in fresh water. I want to congratulate you and commend you for that. It is important. I am a firm believer in citizen science.

In your opening remarks, you talked about certain recommendations for infrastructure and managed sites that could certainly be managed by the federal government, and about support for citizen science programs.

I would like you to talk some more about potential federal government programs to support citizen science initiatives.

Myself, I am going to mention something that already exists, because we don't really need to reinvent the wheel. Since 2019, Quebec's Fonds de recherche has been granting funding under the Engagement program. It is an invitation to members of the public who want to carry out their own research, to encourage participatory science in the province. Unfortunately, there are few or no similar programs in Canada.

Of course we commend the progress made and Quebec's role in the vanguard of this. I would like to know whether we could draw on this model and then consider adopting it here in the federal government.

[Patrick Nadeau]

Thank you very much for your question. It's very interesting.

We believe that citizen science, participatory science, is science. The federal government has a mandate to promote science among the public, in particular through the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

Why not, then, have programs that would encourage citizen science? The Council is already doing this with school-aged children. Why not promote this kind of science among Canadians in general, not just children? I think it's a program that deserves to be adopted.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you.

Could you clarify your thinking on the other points?

You talk about infrastructure. In concrete terms, what could be done to try to support the rollout of infrastructure to stimulate and mobilize the citizen science community?

[Patrick Nadeau]

In this case, there is a lot of talk about digital infrastructure to support these programs. To give you an example, we are currently finalizing a platform that we will be able to use to provide training for a very large number of volunteers at the same time. It is a digital platform.

These days, a person can register to take courses online, but the technology has evolved significantly. This software is very expensive to buy. We need support for acquisitions like this. Typically, when we receive financial support to do participatory science, the funding is for one particular species, for example. There is really no thought being given to the infrastructure needed to support this. A lot of where we are lacking support is for what goes on behind the scenes.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

I understand. So you need financial support to install digital infrastructure, as you say, and then stimulate citizen science.

You talk about managed sites. I understand that these are sites that are managed for birdwatching, among other things. Can you tell us more about this, in concrete terms?

How could the federal government help you in your mission and, again, stimulate community engagement?

[Patrick Nadeau]

I believe we have to go out and meet the public.

At Birds Canada, we always say that birdwatching has to be accessible to everyone. There are several ways to approach the subject, but ultimately it comes down to reducing barriers to access. So we have to figure out what to do in order to reduce those barriers, particularly at sites managed by the Government of Canada. That can mean a very large number of things, such as offering programming for people who have never done it and have never thought about the idea of becoming scientists, for example.

So there has to be programming offered and it has to be shown that it is not just for experts with 25 years' experience. For people to be able to access these apps or this training, they really need to be made more accessible.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Nadeau.

Earlier, we were talking about financial support programs for rollout of your activities in connection with your organization's mission. I refer to the Chief Science Advisor's Youth Council, which published a report in 2022 entitled "Our Vision for Science: Perspectives from the Chief Science Advisor of Canada’s Youth Council" to set out what young people see as the priorities for science. You referred to this. However, we do not see many rollout measures occurring to stimulate citizen science with the help of certain federal government departments.

I am trying to see how to generate commitment on the part of the government and influence public policy to ensure that science is a priority, obviously, but also to be able to popularize science and then to educate and raise awareness on the part of the public.

[Patrick Nadeau]

We know that young people are amazingly interested. When we tell you about the people who work with us to expand participatory science, we include young people.

I can tell you about Gavin, a young boy we discovered in Alberta when he was eight years old and taking part in his very first Christmas bird count. Since then, as a volunteer, he has been coordinating a bird count in his region and he does revisions for the eBird database, which means he is one of the people trying to catch mistakes made by other amateur birdwatchers. He has done all this even before finishing high school.

We know there are young people who, like Gavin, just need a bit of leg up or a way in, to discover participatory science.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Nadeau.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Thank you very much to both individuals.

I'm moving on to the last round of the six-minute spot, which is with MP Cannings.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you.

I'd like to thank all three of you for being here. It's really great to see you.

I wanted to start by picking up on what Mr. Mazier was saying about quality control and dive it into that, because if we look at the programs of Birds Canada, for instance, there's some very impressive quality control that goes on behind the scenes. For full disclosure, I've been part of that for many years.

It's not only experts looking for things. Increasingly, with these huge amounts of data coming in, those controls and the limits of what you can report are being calculated by machine learning.

Maybe Jody could expand on that. What goes on behind the scenes with eBird, the Christmas bird count and other programs—in a quick manner—to make sure that we're getting good data?

[Jody Allair]

We have a real diversity of citizen science programs. Some are very structured and more rigorous, and others are more entry-level programs to engage the next people into science and citizen science. With all of those programs, a unifying factor is that data quality is taken very seriously. There have been hundreds and thousands of scientific papers published citing citizen science data. The reason for that is that it is now broadly accepted that this is high-quality data, and it has become a cornerstone in the biological field.

As an example of what we do internally for our programs, whether they're breeding bird atlases, the Canadian lakes loon survey or eBird—we manage eBird and the Christmas bird count in Canada—we use rigorously tested protocols. We provide intensive training, we incorporate data filters, we regularly review data quality and, very importantly, we implement onboarding for volunteers to move to more challenging programs as they go. All of this is to enhance the experience for the volunteers, but it also allows us to collect rigorous data so we can have an impact on birds. Especially with onboarding and getting more people to take on more complex citizen science programs, that enables us to collect even more relevant and more pertinent data to help make big conservation decisions.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you.

Let me turn to Dr. Reynolds and ask the same thing about iNaturalist.

I know that it's one of your favourite platforms, and I have to blame you for getting me addicted to iNaturalist a few years ago during COVID. I went out with your team in provincial parks, and it was quite a life-changing experience, I have to say. I'll admit to having taken a picture of a centipede in a briefing meeting in the Confederation Building to find out what this huge centipede was that was crawling around the floor.

To get back to quality control, one of the many fascinating things about iNaturalist for me is that, when you post your pictures on iNaturalist, iNaturalist will take an AI guess as to what it is. Almost immediately there are experts from around the world who will come in and say, “No, this is such and such” or “Yes, you're right”. These are citizen scientists who are real scientists who are volunteering their time to make sure that quality control is there, and they're gaining so much. It's amazing that iNaturalist is expanding this knowledge of little-known species because there are so many people involved.

I don't know if there's a question in there, but would you expand on that aspect of experts' being part of that?

[Dr. John Reynolds]

Yes. The reason the New York Times said that it was one of the nicest on-line platforms was the way that people support each other and help out with that. We've all experienced all kinds of examples of things that we have misidentified, put it up as something else, and then it gets corrected quite quickly in a very supportive way.

I once found a small orchid in Yukon that I called a common species, and a high school student in the eastern U.S. said that it was such and such. It turned out that it was a new record of that orchid for Yukon. To be corrected by a kid in high school is a pretty neat experience, because it shows you the level of quality control that goes on.

Studies have shown that eventually most errors do get corrected. Because there's a photo or an audio, anybody can evaluate the evidence and straighten it out. Again, it's great for discovering species that aren't where we thought they were, but, again, you can look at widespread distributions increasingly well now. It doesn't matter if there's the odd error there; it's still gives you the range map.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

I have 30 seconds.

Can you continue and say a bit more about how iNaturalist itself is funnelling into COSEWIC, which hasn't had too much data from obscure species until now, and I'm guessing it's been a bit of a game-changer there, too.