Mr. Speaker, I was coming to the climax of my speech which deals completely with the issue of socioeconomic interests. I thank my hon. friend from the government for basically laying the ground for the hard hitting points at the end.
Group No. 3 deals with socioeconomic interests. We have a great opportunity here because three things are happening this year: the G-8 summit, the new plan for African development and the Rio summit 2 taking place in Johannesburg. We can make a linkage between all three.
The province of KwaZulu-Natal in Africa has managed to merge the issue of sustainable utilization of resources in game parks and share the generation of moneys from hunting, eco-tourism, sustainable fishing, sustainable utilization and growth of medicinal plants, which is a multi-billion rand industry in South Africa alone, with the parks and with the people in the surrounding areas for primary health, education and economic development.
This is a sustainable model that works well. It marries sustainable environmental utilization and development for the primary needs of people in the rural areas. The benefit is sustainable, long lasting and rejuvenates. It will also retard the urbanization taking place on that continent. However this model can be applied everywhere, particularly in Canada where our parks are having tremendous trouble finding even small amounts of money for research. I have met people in the parks department who cannot even find $100 for lights so they can do their anti-poaching work. This is an egregious situation.
I ask the government to look at this model, apply it to the G-8. It will save many lives. We will have sustainable utilization of resources. Better yet, the bottom line principle is if game reserves, parks and wild spaces cannot generate moneys to provide for themselves, they will sadly disappear. There are models that work.
I ask the government to please look at them. We are very happy to help the government with a strong sustainable species at risk act. All we ask is that the government adopt the wonderful amendments, particularly those in Group No. 3.