Tag Archives: Gov of Canada

New federal funding buoys First Nations’ efforts to protect Great Bear Sea

National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Coastal First Nations striving to protect to B.C.’s Great Bear Sea got a boost after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently announced $800 million in funding for Indigenous-led conservation projects.

Spread over seven years, the funding will support projects in B.C., Ontario, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories and is expected to protect a total of one million square kilometres, said Trudeau. The prime minister made the announcement at the global United Nations biodiversity conference, known as COP15, underway in Montreal. 

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Search for the elusive Western Screech Owl

In 2021, the Friends of Cortes Island received funding from the Habitat Stewardship Program to seek out the elusive Western Screech Owls. This research is being guided by the Pacific Megascops Research Alliance, and biologists from the Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship are part of the team. The first season was spring 2022. 

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Canada signs onto global forest restoration challenge at COP15

By Natasha Bulowski, Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Canada promises to restore 19 million hectares of degraded and deforested land by 2030 as international negotiations to save the world’s rapidly dwindling biodiversity carry on in Montreal.

The Dec. 12 announcement makes Canada the 62nd country to sign onto the Bonn Challenge, an initiative launched in 2011 by Germany and the International Union for Conservation of Nature that aims to restore 350 million hectares of degraded and deforested landscapes by 2030 to tackle the twin crises of biodiversity loss and climate change.

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B.C. will soon decide the fate of four projects with big climate and biodiversity impacts

By Matt Simmons, The Narwhal, Local Journalism Initiative reporter

B.C. Premier David Eby’s newly appointed cabinet is about to decide the fate of a handful of proposed projects,  each of which comes with a slew of implications to biodiversity and  climate. 

While provincial ministers wrestle with the decisions, delegates from across the country and around the world are gathered at COP15,  the United Nations biodiversity conference in Montreal. The aim of the  conference is to secure government commitments to slow the global  biodiversity crisis underway — the crisis is sometimes referred to as  the sixth mass extinction and is the first to be human-caused.

Continue reading B.C. will soon decide the fate of four projects with big climate and biodiversity impacts

Leaked letter puts focus on Canada’s forestry trade priorities ahead of COP15

By Natasha Bulowski, Canada’s National Observer, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Canada supports the goals of the European Union’s forestry trade rules, Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault says, after a leaked letter recently revealed the country’s efforts to water down proposed EU regulations right before the United Nations’ global biodiversity conference kicks off in Montreal.

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