Science and Research Committee on Feb. 16th, 2023

[Carl Stewart]

I'd say that our biggest concern out of all of this is just the complete lack of due process. There was no scientific data produced to support this and no consultation with practitioners. Ultimately, there won't be any net benefit to the world.

Canada's nitrogen use efficiency is 72%, which is higher than the global average. Western European countries, for example, have a nitrogen-use efficiency of 61%. Limiting our productivity will lead to higher production in countries with a worse environmental track record than Canadian farmers'. Canadian farmers have been implementing the 4R fertilizer stewardship and best management practices for over 15 years now, with over six million acres verified, and this is all without government intervention.

This policy is disastrously uneconomical, unenvironmental and unscientific.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thank you.

That's all I have, Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Thank you so much.

We're now moving on to MP Collins for six minutes.

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

Thanks, Mr. Chair. If you don't mind, I'll get us back to the citizen science study that we're doing.

After that last exchange, I actually feel compelled to ask about scientific literacy and how we're using and relying on NGOs and organizations across the country and their armies of volunteers to help us with misinformation and disinformation as it relates to science.

Maybe I can start with Ms. Hartwig.

After that last exchange, I started to think about some of the things I heard at the door when going through the election in terms of people questioning vaccines and the effectiveness of vaccines, and questioning science, really. I think most of us around this table would agree that it was science that got us through the pandemic, and I think science will get us through and help us combat climate change, to your point.

If I could, I'll ask Ms. Hartwig for her comments as they relate to how citizen science will help us combat some of the misinformation and disinformation we hear as that relates to our climate crisis—and it is a crisis. How will science and citizen science help the government make informed decisions on policy matters related to the same?

[Kat Hartwig]

Thanks for the question. It's pretty loaded.

Our area of expertise is to empower citizens to do water monitoring and to do community-based water monitoring, driven by and for the community, when they have questions and concerns about water, water security and in particular water that supplies water for food security. For example, where I live in the East Kootenays, we have the challenge of climate change deniers not really believing that we are going to be impacted. Lo and behold, though, we have lakes that are drying up. We have severe drought conditions and flooding. Mother Nature is presenting what's going to happen, whether we like it or not.

I feel that one of the ways we can combat misinformation is by simply doing the work that needs to be done, collecting the data with rigorous scientific protocol and solving problems collectively. I don't think there's an opportunity for us to be pointing fingers at each other. We're all in this together. We all have children. We all need food. We all need water. That may sound idealistic, but I think we need to keep our eye on the ball.

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

Thanks, Ms. Hartwig.

Professor Hajibabaei, can I ask you the same question? Science is more important today, I think, than ever before, and we've made progress in the scientific area over the last 20 or 30 years. Again, that helps us get through the pandemic.

Of course, we've seen the whole questioning of science that has come up from a political perspective. We certainly see it almost every day that we're here in Ottawa. We experience that, obviously, on social media. We even see it in the news today, on a growing basis.

In terms of the work that you're doing—the biodiversity monitoring, what we're doing to try to address and combat our climate crisis—how important is it for you and the citizen scientists you work with to ensure, from an education perspective, that the citizens who are participating and the information that flows to the general public are seen as something worth value?

[Dr. Mehrdad Hajibabaei]

It's definitely a very important topic, and I'm glad that you brought it up. I think that education is the key thing that we need to work on. The earlier we start, I think, the better it will be in terms of the long-term impact.

I'll give you a couple of examples of the work that we have been doing. I'm a bench scientist working in the lab on a computer, but I get to go out to the field and see some of the sites. A few years ago, I had the chance of visiting some of the sites that are used for oil and gas extraction around the Cold Lake area in Alberta. I saw that basically there were large patches of the forest being cleared for the facilities and pipelines, and so on. We were involved with coming in and finding ways to restore the forest to its natural state.

It's just like when you do surgeries. Nowadays, rather than doing these large, invasive surgeries, we can do very small incisions that are more accurate. Imagine if the engineers or the workers involved in this knew the importance of biodiversity and the difficulty of bringing back these forests to their natural states. They would probably be thinking about methods and approaches that could be less harmful to the environment. Even though they are not experts in this field, they could collectively have the knowledge and understanding of, for example, the importance of the environment.

I throw in a key word that we've been thinking about, which is “bioliteracy”. In general, for everything biological, from medical and life sciences to environmental and biodiversity-related issues, I think bioliteracy.... Citizen science programs are some of the best ones. People, whether school kids, indigenous communities or workers in an oil company, will all believe they're part of the scientific enterprise of gathering information. That will allow them to go in and learn what the information is going to be used for. How are the scientists at Environment Canada or at NGOs like Living Lakes going to use this information? That's going to create this bioliteracy layer that we're all looking for.

Nowadays, putting the checks and balances in place, we can actually utilize this information. It's educational, but it's also scientifically very useful for us and probably, for some issues, the only way to go forward.

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

Thanks, Professor.

I have one last question, Mr. Chair. I know I'm running out of time.

My question is for Ms. Hartwig. We went many years without investments in science. In fact, I don't think science was seen in the past as being of much value to the government prior to our government taking office.

You talked about playing catch-up and building capacity. What do you think the government needs to do to make sure that science is important and that we're making key investments in the citizen science area?

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

We are out of time, so you are going to have to submit it in a brief afterwards. We're very interested in your response.

With that, we are now moving on to the next six-minute round with MP Blanchette-Joncas.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to acknowledge the witnesses who have joined us.

Science and scientists like facts, and I imagine parliamentarians do too. I cannot ignore the facts, or the situation mentioned earlier by one of my colleagues, who said that there had been some catching up in terms of investments in science. Let me correct those facts.

Canada is the only G7 country to have cut its investment in research and development over the past 20 years. As far as I know, and again based on the facts, various governments have led this country over the last 20 years. I think there are some people and witnesses around this table who will be able to draw their own conclusions.

I'll come back to the actual topic at hand and address the Living Lakes Canada representatives. I think that most of my colleagues at the table have already understood that I support citizen science and I believe that it is essential on many fronts. As Quebec's chief scientist, Dr. Quirion, previously testified here, we can use citizen science to counter disinformation and increase scientific literacy among the general public.

I would like to hear from the Living Lakes Canada people, who are scientists in the field. How can we bring benefits to citizen science?

[Kat Hartwig]

Thank you for the question. I'm not sure I completely understood. I'm going to reiterate it, and you can tell me if I'm correct or not.

It sounded to me as though you're asking how we can dispel myths and provide more truth around citizen science, or around science in general.

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

I will put my question in simpler terms. I know my introduction was long.

What are the benefits of using citizen science?

I'll take the opportunity to add another question to my first: What can we do, as a government, to support your citizen science initiatives?

[Kat Hartwig]

Thank you for reiterating the question.

I'm going to give the question over to my colleague Raegan Mallinson, but first I want to say that citizen science has access to sectors that the government may not normally have access to. Through social media, we are able to access young people, make science interesting and sexy, and make people want to participate. That's an avenue that, perhaps, is less available to the government.

I'll pass this on to Raegan, who directs our biomonitoring, and then I'll come back to your second question of what the government can do. Actually, I might answer that now.

I think what the government can do is help us build partnerships. We have 60 recommendations that we provided to the government, but I think that if we can have fewer silos and have more co-operation, and build exciting programs together, which we already have with the University of Guelph, for example, with Mehrdad and with the WWF.... There are really amazing and innovative partnerships. For example, we have partnered with the Alpine Club of Canada for our high-elevation monitoring, so we get skiers, snowboarders and alpinists helping to collect data.

We can make it fun and interesting, and not as daunting for young people. We have to inspire hope.

With that, I'll pass it to Raegan. Thank you.

[Raegan Mallinson, Manager, Biomonitoring Program, Living Lakes Canada]

Thank you so much for that question.

What citizen science can do and what advantages it provides include, as Mehrdad was mentioning, multidisciplinary partnerships. Those are key to everyone serving and operating out of their strengths, whether it be the citizens or the communities in their local or indigenous knowledge, and then the researchers in data analysis, interpretation and large-scale projects.

Multidisciplinary projects are very important. They provide huge cost savings. Instead of the government having to travel to remote sites to provide reference sites, we've been working with communities to provide that information right in their backyards. They also provide, again, remote data, which other speakers have spoken to. This is really important for water data.

Scientific literacy builds trust in the institutions, because there are opportunities for communication and understanding.

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

Thank you very much.

I want to come back to the importance of citizen science.

In 2019, the G7 Academies of Science issued a joint statement on citizen science in the Internet era ahead of the G7 Summit in Biarritz, France.

That statement contained a number of recommendations, including one to create specific funding programs for citizen science. As we know, some initiatives already exist. Dr. Rémi Quirion, Quebec's chief scientist, came before us to present the Engage program. However, it is clear that the federal government has done very little to increase the visibility of certain projects or establish projects providing financial support to citizen science.

I would like to hear your comments on that.

Is it important to have financial support from the government to create and develop citizen science initiatives?

[Kat Hartwig]

Who is the question directed to?

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

I'm addressing this important question to anyone from your organization who can answer it.

[Kat Hartwig]

I'll start if you don't mind.

I will say that, yes, we need support from the government. I think that Canada is a laggard in that department. We fund projects for specific species at risk and things like that, but what we don't do is make normal community-based water monitoring or citizen science. We work with the Global Nature Fund in Germany, and we're connected to Living Lakes International. It's astounding the comparisons between the EU and Canada in terms of the money that's allocated for community-based water monitoring both indigenous and non-indigenous led.

For example, in the Columbia Basin, to collect the water data in order to allow our communities to have—

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

I apologize. We are 45 seconds over already and we're not even getting through—

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

Mr. Chair—

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

I would ask you and the other panellists if they can write a written brief to explain your answers to that question. It would be much appreciated.

We will move on to the last spot in the six-minute round. We have MP Cannings.

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

Thank you.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

I'm really struck in this panel by the whole concept of collaboration, especially hearing from Living Lakes and STREAM about all the partners that you've mentioned, whether it's Environment Canada, Parks Canada, University of Guelph, the CABIN program or all these other citizen science programs that are feeding in. I know Living Lakes has a whole suite of those projects across the country.

I'll start with Ms. Hartwig.

It's always good to talk to somebody speaking from the Kootenays. Can you maybe elaborate on that concept of collaboration, which is something you mentioned in your recommendations, and on how the federal government can help you with that collaboration process?

I'll let you take that away.

[Kat Hartwig]

Thank you for the question, Mr. Cannings, and thank you for helping to organize this session. I think it's very important.

Collaborations are everything. We are in an era of a climate crisis. We can't be working in our silos. We must reach across and do multisector collaborations.

It depends on the project. For example, as I was saying earlier, in the high elevation monitoring program, we've collaborated with unlikely people who are now becoming water literate—the Alpine Club of Canada and high-elevation [Technical difficulty—Editor] managers. We know that we're past peak flow in the Columbia Basin, which means that we have diminishing returns in our water supply from glacial melt, which means that our recharge rates are changing and it means that snowpack is changing and all of these urgent things that people are now understanding in these partnerships.

We partner with Teck, the coal mine, in terms of looking at some of the water quality issues in the Elk Valley. We partner with indigenous partners.

I'll maybe defer to Georgia, who hasn't had a chance to speak about some of the partnerships she's developed through the foreshore management project that she's doing.

[Georgia Peck, Manager, Lakes Program, Living Lakes Canada]

Absolutely. Thank you very much, Kat.

Through the foreshore integrated management planning project, which was originally created by Fisheries and Oceans Canada in the early 2000s, we have developed some pretty exemplary partnerships with indigenous communities across British Columbia to help move this project process forward in the most inclusive way possible.

We have recently co-created a local indigenous knowledge and values framework with the Upper Nicola Band located in Okanagan, B.C., to ensure inclusivity throughout the project.

As Kat mentioned, climate change is a global issue and one that we cannot tackle alone. Collaborations and partnerships have never been more important than they are today. As you mentioned, the Kootenays are an amazing example of how those partnerships and collaborations can propel movement forward.

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

Thank you.

I'd like to quickly turn to Dr. Hajibabaei to talk more about the biological. I'm very curious. I know more collaboration.... Things I've reported on iNaturalist have ended up getting bar-coded by your people.

In STREAM, what is the breadth of the biodiversity that you monitor through that bar-coding?