The WWF report also prioritizes latest areas for cover by in search of overlaps in conservation values, including areas with high numbers of species in danger corresponding to B.C.’s Okanagan Valley.
Indigenous-managed conservation areas are key to Canada’s pledge to designate nearly one third of its land and ocean waters for biodiversity protection by the top of this decade, in keeping with a latest report.
The report from World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Canada stresses that protected areas must be “co-developed and implemented with Indigenous consent” as a part of Canada’s reconciliation process.
Its release on Tuesday coincides with efforts by a bunch of world leaders, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, to press their counterparts on biodiversity preservation ahead of international negotiations in Montreal later this 12 months.
Mr. Trudeau is about to talk at an event on Tuesday evening occurring on the margins of the UN General Assembly, now under way in Recent York. The event was co-organized by the High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People, a bunch of greater than 100 countries which have all formally endorsed the goal of protecting at the least 30 per cent of the world’s land and oceans by 2030.
Ottawa has previously committed to the coalition’s 30×30 goal in addition to an intermediate goal of designating 25 per cent of the country for cover by 2025.
Canada is playing a pivotal role in the worldwide discussion around conserving nature because the host of the following meeting of signatories to the UN Convention on Biodiversity, set to happen in December. The conference, co-chaired by China, was originally scheduled to happen in Kunming in 2020 but delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic after which moved to Montreal. A successful meeting is widely considered essential if the world is to avert a looming biodiversity crisis.
Along with hosting the meeting, Canada faces a big task with its own commitments.
Protection gaps
An evaluation of wilderness areas in Canada took into consideration the scale, quality and connectivity of protected areas. The outcomes discover gaps and help discover latest areas that must be prioritized for cover.
THE GLOBE AND MAIL, SOURCE:
WORLD WILDLIFE FUND CANADA
Protection gaps
An evaluation of wilderness areas in Canada took into consideration the scale, quality and connectivity of protected areas. The outcomes discover gaps and help discover latest areas that must be prioritized for cover.
THE GLOBE AND MAIL, SOURCE:
WORLD WILDLIFE FUND CANADA
Protection gaps
An evaluation of wilderness areas in Canada took into consideration the scale, quality and connectivity of protected areas. The outcomes discover gaps and help discover latest areas that must be prioritized for cover.
THE GLOBE AND MAIL, SOURCE: WORLD WILDLIFE FUND CANADA
So far, only 13.5 per cent of Canada’s land area has been given some type of protected status, together with a rather higher portion of its marine and coastal waters. That leaves the federal government, along with the provinces and territories, only just a few years through which to fulfill the brand new targets.
“I believe, increasingly, we’re on a worldwide stage and so the leadership, the motion that we’re taking matters in some ways, just as much because the announcements that we’re making,” said James Snider, WWF Canada’s vice-president of science, knowledge and innovation.
Scientists and conservation groups have long emphasized that what matters isn’t simply the quantity of territory protected but precisely where it’s and the way it’s managed with a view to meaningfully safeguard threatened species and ecosystems.
The WWF Canada report is the newest try and discover which wilderness areas to prioritize for designated status.
The report identifies several gaps where ecologically sensitive regions are inadequately protected. It then considers where additional protection may be only by prioritizing areas that provide multiple advantages. These include preserving habitat for species in danger, storing carbon in forests and soil, providing ecological refuges and corridors to assist species cope with climate change and allowing connectivity across the landscape.
Above all, nevertheless, the report stresses that Indigenous protected and conserved areas, or IPCAs, must be given high priority for protected status. These are areas where Indigenous peoples play a primary role in conserving ecosystems.
As examples, the report highlights 4 IPCAs in Canada. They include the Saskatchewan River Delta, the biggest inland delta in North America, northern Manitoba’s Seal River Watershed, Nunavut’s Aviqtuuq region, also generally known as the Boothia Peninsula, and a sprawling transitional zone between forest and tundra, called Thaidene Nene, within the Northwest Territories.
Steven Nitah, an Indigenous conservation leader and a managing director for Nature for Justice, an environmental advocacy organization, said he agrees with the report. Studies show that Indigenous-managed lands are ecologically healthier, he said. Natural areas are also emerging as a key defence in the worldwide response to climate change. Noting that Canada could possibly be seeking to international carbon markets as a option to help support conservation on Indigenous lands, Mr. Nitah said. “Why not tie them together as a possibility?”
The WWF report also prioritizes latest areas for cover by in search of overlaps in conservation values to see which geographic locations provide the best returns.
Among the many areas that emerge from the exercise are large swaths of Labrador, peatlands west of Hudson Bay and far of Baffin Island. Areas with high numbers of species in danger, including B.C.’s Okanagan Valley and the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River lowlands, also register prominently.
The outcomes dovetail with ongoing work by scientists to offer a more precise and universal technique of recognizing high-value ecological sites, called key biodiversity areas, or KBAs. In Canada, a registry for such areas is about to be launched next month.
Peter Soroye, a researcher and outreach co-ordinator for the Wildlife Conservation Society of Canada, praised the report’s concentrate on protecting and supporting the rights of Indigenous peoples as a part of Canada’s approach to conservation.
In the world of species protection, he added that the approach could possibly be broadened to include not only threatened species but entire ecosystems that face elimination.
He said the KBA approach “summarizes all of the things that we wish to guard most, from a purely biological perspective, right into a single tool.”
