:
I'll jump into it anyway.
In my presentation I will spend a few minutes speaking about why we should care about invasive alien species; provide an overview of a national strategy, an invasive alien species strategy for Canada that was developed a few years ago; and then speak a bit to both interjurisdictional coordination—domestically, I mean, not internationally so much—and then the federal role.
Invasive alien species is what I would call a horizontal file that involves a number of agencies.
Turning to slide 3, dealing with why we should care about invasive alien species, I'll start with a definition.
Alien species are simply species of plants, animals, and micro-organisms introduced by human action outside of their historic or current range. When do they become harmful or invasive? It is when they have an economic, a social, an environmental, and perhaps even a human health impact.
In Canada we have a number of alien species, and then within that there are a number of species that actually cause harm to our environment, our economy, or our society.
It's estimated that there are about 70,000 species in Canada. About 12,000 of those have been assessed in something called the Wild Species 2010 report. That's about 17% of the species that we have in Canada. Of those approximately 12,000 species, about 1,400 or about 12% have been identified as alien species.
Of those more than 1,400 species, about 90% are invasive plants. And then spiders, believe it or not—about 70 invasive spiders—and about 50 or more ground beetles have been identified as alien species in that report.
I've mentioned already the economic, environmental, and social impact, and we have a few statistics or factors mentioned on slide 3 as well. There is no actual systematic assessment of the economic impact of invasive alien species in Canada. Even for the existing investment studies and assessments, I've heard kind of crude if not conservative estimates on the economic impact of invasive alien species. There are studies that suggest the impact might be $20 billion or more in the forest sector. You can see the numbers for the great lakes as well as the agricultural sector. Certainly, invasive alien species have an impact on the health and status of Canadian species--17% of species at risk in Canada are at least partly at risk because of the impact of invasive alien species. Globally, in about 40% of species that are extinct, invasive alien species were at least part of the reason for their extinction.
You will see from the next slide, slide 4, entitled “Why Care About Invasive Alien Species”, that the number of invasive species in Canada continues to rise and their distributions in the country continue to expand. I think there are two primary reasons why. One is globalization. The magnitude of international trade, transport, and travel is very large. Historically in Canada a key source of invasive species was western Europe, but we have much more diverse markets now, Asia for example, so there are new species coming in from these newly developed markets.
The second factor is likely the warming climate making our ecosystems more receptive to foreign invaders. When we had longer and colder winters, that was very effective in preventing species from becoming established. We have examples of where the climate conditions changed such that, although it's not an alien species, the mountain pine beetle has been able to expand its distribution primarily in British Columbia and getting into Alberta.
In terms of the cumulative number of invasive species, there is a little chart at the bottom of this slide showing those many alien plant species that I mentioned. The big growth was between 1800 and 1900 as Canada was developed. We're now seeing about one new plant species every two years, approximately, so the pace has slowed. But there are still new invasive plants arriving in Canada.
Turning to the next slide, titled “An Invasive Alien Species Strategy for Canada”, the development of this strategy arose out of a decision by the federal, provincial, and territorial ministers to prioritize invasive alien species. It was taken in the context of the Canadian biodiversity strategy and led to those ministers approving the strategy. It's one of the documents that I've made available to the committee. The strategy establishes a very broad goal to protect our ecosystems and native biodiversity, as well as the domestic plants and animals that are important to our economy, from the risks posed by invasive alien species. The scope is broad and inclusive. It's applicable to intentional or purposeful introductions, both authorized and illegal, and all unintentional or accidental introductions.
The strategy established a prioritized approach. Rather than managing invasive alien species after the fact--often once they're established, it's almost impossible to eradicate them--the approach is to move a little bit more to the front end with prevention, early detection, and rapid response. We will always have management because some of these species have a big economic impact.
The tools that we use include legislation and regulations. Risk analysis is a very important activity, and the federal government is very extensively involved in risk analysis and science components and education and outreach as well as international cooperation.
The focus on prevention rather than dealing with a species-by-species approach takes us to a focus on what we call pathways of introduction. For example, wood crates could have any number of foreign beetles, or what have you. If we address that particular pathway, a larger number of potentially invasive alien species can be prevented from entering into Canada.
Pages 34 and 35 of the strategy pictorially describe what I just mentioned on this slide, and on page 35 a large number of pathways of introduction are identified.
The next slide is on roles and responsibilities. I mentioned previously that invasive alien species is a very horizontal issue involving federal, provincial, territorial, aboriginal, and municipal governments, but addressing invasive species doesn't stop with government action. I definitely think it's important that stakeholders like industry have a key role to play. Non-government organizations are active on this file, as well as academic researchers and the general public.
Turning to the next slide, on interjurisdictional coordination, subcommittees have been established federally and provincially to address some of the thematic areas. We have an invasive alien terrestrial animal species subcommittee, an aquatic invasive species committee under the federal-provincial fisheries and aquaculture ministers, and a national forest pest strategy technical committee. Sectoral documents have been developed by those governance mechanisms I've just mentioned. They focus on terrestrial plant and plant pests, invasive plant framework, a plan to address the threats of aquatic invasive species, and a Canadian wildlife disease strategy.
I'd like to welcome our witnesses. Thank you very much for joining us today for this very interesting subject matter. It is important to our economy, in looking at some of the numbers here. It involves a lot of challenging mechanisms for implementation in terms of monitoring the movement of plants, animals, and insects.
My first question comes out of the definition--maybe a good starting place. I notice in your first deck you define alien species of plants, animals, and micro-organisms introduced by human action outside of their natural past or present distribution. I'll come back to that. But invasive, of course, simply means harmful. So it's important to define these terms.
On harmful species that have moved, can you give us some ideas? Since these definitions were adopted in 2004, where do you draw the line when you're talking about natural past and present distributions? There has to be a starting point, since species and humans have moved around. What did you use as a starting point?
:
It would be on a list for you. Of course we're focusing on terrestrial species here. The committee had done something on aquatic species in the past, and I guess with an amphibian we're kind of in between here. It spends a lot of time on land but certainly has an impact in water in a big way.
We're talking about the Garry oaks ecosystem on the west coast—in the Coastal Mountains, Olympic Mountains, and certainly in my area on Vancouver Island. Part of our Mount Arrowsmith biosphere was identified because of the presence of Garry oak ecosystems in some areas in my riding.
Scotch broom has also become a real problem. We have local programs again, cutting broom in bloom, trying to eradicate this. Along open pathways it is displacing other plants that deer like to graze on and so on. There is salal. Maybe that's not correct to say salal, but there are other plants, such as lupin along the roadsides and so on, all being displaced by mile after mile of Scotch broom if we don't take that down. It's amazing how it has spread. And again, you'd be aware of these as species, but management plans are not Environment Canada's concern. That's worked out with cooperation among Canada, the provinces, and municipal and local authorities.
:
First of all, thank you very much, Mr. Chair and members of the committee, for the invitation to contribute to this particular study. I will be presenting this powerpoint presentation entitled "Invasive Species in National Parks of Canada".
As my colleague from Environment Canada mentioned, once these invasive alien species arrive within our border, some very quickly expand their distribution, and it probably does not come as a surprise that they end up in one of our 42 national parks.
The second slide, as my colleague mentioned, is basically the definition of what an invasive species is. The two photos highlight some of the species we need to deal with within our national parks system. There's a photo of the zebra mussels that are found in the Great Lakes system, which are continuing their expansion, and one of a fungus called whitebark pine blister rust, which is affecting specific species of pine trees and alpine species in our Rocky Mountains national parks.
How do we manage invasive species? We manage them to meet our mandate, which is to ensure the ecological integrity of our national parks for present and future generations. Invasive alien species will simply be another of the stressors we need to manage to maintain or restore ecological integrity.
Ecological integrity is defined as “a condition that is determined to be characteristic of its natural region and likely to persist, including abiotic components and the composition and abundance of native species and biological communities, rates of change and supporting processes” within that ecosystem. We can certainly see from that definition that there are two areas: the impact on the native species within the national park and the fact that many of these species are not part of that particular ecosystem.
Over 1,000 occurrences of invasive species have been found to occur in national parks. This is not 1,000 species. Rather, through our monitoring system we've detected over 1,000 occurrences of species that have been determined to be exotic or invasive alien species.
We are monitoring some of these species in 26 of our national parks. Our southern national parks are being affected the most, and this is where we're focusing our attention. Many of our national parks in the north, in Canada's Arctic, have not had similar types of impact due to the climatic conditions.
I'm going to walk the committee through some of the examples of what we call problematic invasive species. As my colleague from Environment Canada mentioned, we cannot take action on all of these species. We are focusing on certain ones that are having significant effects on the ecological integrity of our national parks.
The first one is spotted knapweed. It was introduced from Eurasia. It displaces many of our native grasses and native forbs in open areas and is found primarily in western Canada, including in our Rocky Mountains national parks, Riding Mountain National Park, and Grasslands National Park.
We have programs in some of these parks to work with the landowners outside our boundaries to control the expansion, and in some cases to eradicate this particular species from specific areas. A very good program that's ongoing at the moment is out in Waterton Lakes National Park, where we're working with the ranchers, along with neighbouring communities, to try to control the expansion of this weed.
The next example is the white pine blister rust. It's a fungus that was introduced into Canada from Eurasia and it's having a significant impact on our alpine pine species, in particular the whitebark pine. This is again, as I mentioned earlier, found in our Rocky Mountains national parks, and from the photos you can see it can in fact have a very devastating impact on this particular pine species.
We're working right now in close collaboration with our colleagues in the U.S. National Park Service in Glacier National Park, which is just south of Waterton Lakes, to identify particular specimens of white bark pine that in fact appeared to be immune to this particular blister rust. And hopefully in the future we'll be able to develop specific specimens of the species in order to restore the species back into the landscape.
Moving on to the next slide, I'd like to talk a little bit about the Norway brown rat. This is a rodent that originates from Asia, in northern China and Mongolia, and it has arrived in Canada through early trade, fishing vessels and other types of marine travel. It is having a significant impact on our colonial bird species in some of our national parks, in particular in Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve in British Columbia. This particular invasive species is really affecting the population of seabirds such as the ancient murrelet, which burrows on the land in some of these coastal islands. We're working with the province, along with other partners, to in fact try to eradicate this species from some of the islands, and with some success.
I was mentioning to colleagues outside the room that when I was visiting one of the projects in Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve it appeared that on some of the islands we are having an impact, through baiting, of removing some of the rats from some of the coastal islands. With respect to the national park system, this particular species is found in 19 other Parks Canada sites beyond Gwaii Haanas.
How do these invasive species get into our national parks landscape? It's primarily through activities such as road construction, where new soil or machines are moved from one area to another, bringing along the seeds or the larvae of these particular species. And my colleague mentioned that through the increase in temperature over the last few decades we're seeing the expansion of some of these species.
We do have management tools in place within Parks Canada, and the next slide identifies a series of them, including our park management plan and specific policy on removing invasive species.
The last few slides are really an example of how Parks Canada works with volunteers and works with partners to control some of these invasive species.
The example that we're using is Gulf Islands National Park Reserve in British Columbia, where we are attempting to restore a specific species within the Garry oak ecosystem, and our staff are working with the local communities and volunteers on programs such as Broom Sweep, which is meant to remove Scotch broom from that landscape.
There are continuing challenges, and they're no different from some of the challenges identified by my colleague in the national strategy.
Thank you very much.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
It seems to me that in terms of invasive species, the first thing we have to do is make a distinction between which are harmful and which are basically neutral. For those ones that are harmful, I strongly support an approach that directly deals with them.
Of course in terms of Canada being a trading nation, we have to accept that with the many upsides of trade certainly come some costs. Canada's openness to the world puts it at a heightened risk for invasive species, but the benefits of trade are so enormous that trading will continue.
To me, the key is dealing in an effective manner with invasive species that are truly damaging.
Mr. McLean and Mr. Wong, can you give me examples of any invasive species that have been established in Canada and successfully eradicated?
:
That was the example I would have quoted. As you noted, the degree of invasiveness, or the degree of damage that a particular species can cause, varies. Asian longhorned beetle is a more observable beetle that causes large-scale damage, very large holes, in the trees it attacks.
The Canadian Food Inspection Agency and the Canadian Forest Service of Natural Resources Canada, as my colleague said, were able to detect that invasion and establishment early, as opposed to the emerald ash borer, which was mentioned earlier by one of the members of the committee, that is extremely cryptic. By the time you can see symptoms within an affected tree—really, the population of trees in that area—it is past being able to respond in a positive way.
So invasiveness, damage, is very much species-specific. Asian longhorned beetle is one of the few very good success stories. It's still under quarantine, but it is considered controlled in Canada. At this time there are other outbreaks in the United States, particularly in Massachusetts, that bear watching as well.
:
Sure. Again, I think it's important to make sure we assess these programs. Back in prairie Canada, there have been purple loosestrife control programs for decades, and the species is still there. It seems to have settled in with everything else that's on the ground there, and it seems to be part of ecosystem now, with minimal damage.
One of the things that I think we have to be careful of, too.... I understand the administrative need to talk about invasive alien species, the non-native species that actually cause harm, and I support that, but I think we also have to look at the range expansion of certain species due to human activities. These are native species that are invading new habitats because of human activities.
In terms of prairie Canada specifically, I think of the skunk, fox, and racoon, which are rapidly moving north with the expansion of agriculture and having devastating effects on prairie birds. So I would urge you--and all of us--not to limit this program to only the non-native alien species.
The other thing is that we don't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater here, because a number of “alien species” that humans have deliberately introduced to Canada are doing very well and contributing to human well-being. Again, being a fisheries person myself, I tend to go to the aquatic stuff: the salmon in the Great Lakes, where the non-native species are very important to the Great Lakes economies, and the brown trout, a European fish introduced all across North America that is providing countless hours of angling enjoyment with very little damage.
It's very, very important to look at the ecological function of the actual species and focus like a laser on those species that actually cause harm.
I represent an agricultural area, so I'll focus on agriculture for a minute. In terms of agriculture, which are the main species that cause the majority of the damage in agricultural ecosystems?
Thank you to our witnesses today for coming to speak to us about this very important topic. It's my hope that with this study we can examine the effects of invasive land species and the effects they have on all Canadians, because a threat in one part of the country one day could be a threat in another part by the next.
My view is that only by prioritizing the invasive species that pose the greatest threats can we ensure that we're spending money wisely. To ensure that the federal government is targeting the most damaging invasive species in prioritization ensures that we're doing so in a resource-effective manner. As an example, I'd like to say that some land-based invasive species are likely to stay in Canada. The example I give is the rat, not the common household rat. Notwithstanding Mr. Wong's mention of the Norway brown rat, I think we would all agree that it would be impossible to eliminate the common rat. So we have to focus on what's doable and make that our approach and concentrate, frankly, on what's truly controllable.
I'd like to start my questions by asking for a clarification of Environment Canada's role with regard to invasive species. On page 9 of Mr. McLean's slide deck you mentioned that Environment Canada chairs a federal directors general interdepartmental steering committee on invasive alien species. Who is on this committee? Who are the members? Could you elaborate on what the committee does?
Good afternoon. I am pleased to present my October 2011 report, which was tabled in the House of Commons this morning.
With me are colleagues Bruce Sloan and Kimberley Leach, as well as David Willey and Francine Richard.
[Translation]
First of all, Mr. Chair, I have the pleasure of introducing Mr. Touré, Mali's new Auditor General. Our office is contributing to a capacity building project for the Office of the Auditor General of Mali, in partnership with the Canadian International Development Agency and the Canada School of Public Service.
Welcome, Mr. Touré.
[English]
Mr. Chair, since I began as commissioner three years ago, a recurring theme in my reports has been the significant gaps in the information needed to understand and respond to the changing state of our environment. The audit results presented in this report show that the government is still struggling with this issue.
[Translation]
The first chapter of my report is about climate change plans and the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act.
The act requires the government to produce these plans every year. The purpose of this requirement is to ensure that Canada meets its Kyoto commitments by 2012.
[English]
The act requires me to analyze these plans and report on the government's progress in implementing them and meeting its obligations. This is our office's second such report.
We found several improvements in the completeness and transparency of the information contained in the climate change plans. However, we also found that the government lacks the tools it needs to achieve, measure, and report greenhouse gas emission reductions. As a result, the government doesn't know what it has accomplished so far with $9 billion allocated in the 2010 climate change plan.
[Translation]
Canada will fall short of the greenhouse gas emission target set by the Kyoto Protocol. In fact, the government has reduced its expectations. It has made new emission reduction commitments, but it remains to be seen whether they are attainable.
[English]
Climate change is already having a major impact on Canadian ecosystems and the health of Canadians. To reach the new target the federal government committed to under the Copenhagen accord, it will need to address the weaknesses in current management practices.
In chapter 2 we examined the government's assessment of the cumulative environmental effects of oil sands projects in northern Alberta. When there are several development projects in the same region, it's important to understand their combined impacts on the environment and how to minimize them. Failure to prevent environmental impacts from the start can lead to significant problems down the road.
[Translation]
The government has not put in place a system that can monitor the cumulative environmental impact in this region. We have found that decisions made about oil sands development projects have been based on incomplete, mediocre or non-existent environmental data.
Since 1999, the federal government scientists have been saying that the effects of the oil sands on water, soil, air, fish, fauna and habitat are now well-known.
[English]
In response to a 2010 report from the oil sands advisory panel, the federal government committed to establishing a comprehensive environmental monitoring system for the lower Athabasca River basin.
[Translation]
The government has established a detailed and comprehensive plan to put in place a good environmental monitoring system. We look forward to reporting to Parliament on the implementation of this plan in our future reports.
[English]
Mr. Chair, we'll now be happy to take your questions.
Thank you.
:
First of all, thank you.
When we started auditing this plan, which we have a legal obligation to do under the CEAA, we said “This is the government's plan, so what is the budget for your plan?” We were told that nobody had done a roll-up of the 34 programs into a total budget. This is important for basic transparency to help Parliament make a determination of value for money.
So on the $9.2 billion that has been allocated, we made a recommendation to provide details on what has been spent. From those expenditures some insights and judgments can be made on what the value for money is, which is our role in helping Parliament make those determinations. We made that recommendation, but Environment Canada did not accept it. They said, to be fair, there are other ways they report financial expenditures.
When we compared the 2009 plan to the 2010 plan, the level of anticipated reductions had dropped by 90%. The majority of that was due to the cancellation of one program, the regulatory framework. It comprised 85% of the older approach. So we said that recorded emission reductions for 2010 were two megatonnes. In 2009 they were anticipated to be about 28. They went from 28 to two. We said that was a significant change and commented on that, because we had an obligation under the act to inform Parliament. If a program is changed or cancelled, the government has an obligation under the act to show where there's redress--where there is another program to compensate for a program that has been removed. That's why we raised it to Parliament's attention.
Finally, we didn't do a value-for-money determination, and it's important that the $9.2 billion is allocated. It's over a five-year period. We also took note that Environment Canada's own internal analysis has said that some of the programs were bringing greenhouse gas emission reductions of $92,000 per tonne, which is pretty expensive under any measure.
:
Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the commissioner and his colleagues for being with us today.
I wanted to start with chapter 1 and the timeline that you established on page 18 of your report, which is a very good review of Canada's commitments related to greenhouse gas emissions beginning with the Earth Summit back in 1992 in Rio. Kyoto was adopted in 1997, the previous government signed for Canada in 1998, and then of course we had a change in government in 2006. As we go through that, going forward to the current government's commitment in 2007--the “Turning the Corner” plan is announced, the government commits to reducing GHG emissions by 20% below Canada's 2006 level by 2020--around the same time, we have the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act, which was introduced by the opposition parties in a minority Parliament. I want to refer to the fact that your predecessor referred to the progress that was made all the way back to the initial commitments in 1992 as Canada, along with the world, began to consider actions that might be taken. There was absolutely no record of progress or planning or implementation to achieve the objectives that Canada was committing to under the previous government.
To quote your predecessor, Ms. Gélinas, on March 4, 2008, she said, "We expected that the federal government would have conducted economic, social, environmental, and risk analyses in support of its decision to sign the Kyoto Protocol in 1998...we found that little economic analysis was completed, and the government was unable to provide evidence of detailed social, environmental, or risk analyses."
Coming back to the KPIA, which you're reporting on today, as you're mandated, Mr. Commissioner, the KPIA was a private member's bill. There is some criticism in your report that the current government of Canada had not put financial measures in place, but of course the private member's bill itself had no financial instruments attached to it, since it was a private member's bill and outside the scope of such a bill. I just wanted to put that on the record that there are no requirements in the bill itself.
But taking that to our current commitments, under the Copenhagen accord we have committed to 17% below 2005 levels, or 607 megatonnes, and that's compatible with the United States. With the Copenhagen program, we now have many more nations involved, including the large emitters, in trying to achieve some objectives, and the government is working on a sector-by-sector basis through regulation to have an action plan in place. For example, on the industrial output of tail-pipe emissions on light trucks and heavy duty trucks, we are making progress and even the measures that have been agreed upon with the provinces and with industry thus far are expected to reduce emissions by about 65 megatonnes. Of course, there's much more to do.
So I just wanted to put on the record that we've started with a regulatory deficit in spite of the good intentions of previous governments, but we are taking steps to bring this into line. I'll leave that as a comment and go on to chapter 2 and raise a question there, a follow-up to Mr. Sopuck's observations.
In chapter 2 you mention 140,000 square kilometres of oil sands resource, and the 60 square kilometres or so that have been reclaimed. Apparently, examining positive impacts of the extraction over time hasn't been part of the mandate.
I want to draw attention to the fact that Patrick Moore, a PhD, a man with an environmental record, just a week ago made a statement about the extraction in the oil sands, which he describes as a mining operation that is not pretty but is being done in an acceptable manner. There were some images there of areas that haven't been touched by industry so far that have oil floating along the water naturally, and that after extraction--it might take 20 years--the environment might be significantly improved by the extraction process, if you take time to examine an environment that's already got an oil problem. I just wonder if you would agree with Mr. Moore that that's certainly within the scope of possibility, if we take a longer-range perspective.
:
I'll ask my colleague Francine Richard, who is our CEAA expert. Maybe she could come to the table.
Within the five evaluations of environmental assessments, there is, under the CEAA Act, the wording that cumulative effects should be considered. The wording is so vague that “considered” is fairly open. That's one of our conclusions that we put in the perspective at the beginning.
Within a project-by-project assessment, they will do a project-related environmental assessment. Then within that context, they're also supposed to provide consideration of the combined or cumulative effects of that project in relation to the other projects that either are in place or are planned to be in place in the next five to ten years. What we found is that this part of the CEAA is an important one. It's a difficult one. Cumulative environmental assessments are tough. Right now the wording of the act is such that they're single project assessments. But as the government has acknowledged in its July phase two report, the ultimate objective of the government's new approach and the new plan is to put in place a cumulative environmental monitoring system for the region that goes beyond project-to-project and actually looks at some regional characteristics of environmental change.
It's a long answer. If in the committee's future work there is a review of CEAA.... I think this may be one area that I felt sufficiently important to put in the perspective, because I think this ambiguity has created problems in terms of reliable information on findings.
Mr. Chair, I want to say that I noticed from the questioning that at least of one of the opposition members did not seem to be aware that in fact a plan existed. I was a bit surprised if not shocked to hear that. I want to make an offer through you, Mr. Chair. I do have the plan. It's several hundred pages. I have it right here. I would be happy to give it to any of the members opposite who would like to have a look at it, if they are inclined to do so. I definitely recommend that they do. In fact, Mr. Chair, there is a list of several dozen scientists who contributed to the drafting of the plan, who they could contact, including an eminent expert, Dr. David Schindler, from the University of Alberta, who was one of the reviewers.
Having said that, Mr. Chair, I regret that Ms. Leslie had to leave the room before I was able to provide that assistance.
Commissioner, you made a comment somewhere along the way that decisions have been based on incomplete or poor information. Do you recall that comment?