Unceded Algonquin Territory — Ottawa, ON | June 14, 2024

Nature Canada applauds yesterday’s 2030 Biodiversity Strategy release as a significant step forward for nature protection and welcomes the accompanying Nature Accountability Act (C-73). The Strategy provides a transformative vision and framework for halting and reversing biodiversity loss by 2030, including protecting 30 percent of Canada’s lands and waters. To be successful, the strategy will depend on ambitious action and significant investments.

“Minister Guilbeault deserves credit for his courage, vision and leadership in defining a strategy that he knows will go under the microscope of every ENGO, every land steward, every fisherman, logger, and nature-lover in the country,” says Emily McMillan, Executive Director of Nature Canada. “And while the exact wording gives way too much wiggle room for this and future governments, we now have a path to nature restoration and we can start walking that path today.”

Canada stands poised to position itself as a global leader in nature protection, if it can act on the strategies it has outlined in the 2030 Biodiversity Strategy. By placing biodiversity as a key variable for decision-makers to consider in all of their actions, this combined Strategy and Act will support future generations and the future of our planet.

Nature Canada will be looking for additional clarity on funding and provincial partnerships starting this fall as the UN reconvenes the Conference on Biological Diversity at COP16 in October. That meeting will be a natural moment for the Minister to herald new investments and announce progress on key targets, especially the government’s ambitious conservation goal to protect 30 percent of land and water by 2030.

“Indigenous nations, provinces, territories and international players all need to be at the table for the 2030 Biodiversity Strategy to meet its targets,” notes Julia Laforge, Protected Areas Policy Manager at Nature Canada. “The ambition in this strategy is not matched by a concrete plan of action. There is a lot of room for partners to step into it and own it.”

Nature Canada is looking forward to seeing a concerted, purposeful effort across all levels of government to halt and reverse biodiversity loss. This Strategy and proposed legislation is a good first step but now it needs to be followed up with meaningful action and funding to do the hard work of restoring nature and protecting what’s left.

Canada has taken an important step on the pathway to meeting its commitments under the 2022 Kunming-Montréal Global Biodiversity Framework. Nature Canada applauds the emphasis placed on Indigenous-led conservation and the recognition of the important role Indigenous people play in conserving biodiversity. We also welcome the reiteration of the government’s commitment to identify, and reform or redirect, nature-harming subsidies that undermine efforts to protect biodiversity.

Notably, Nature Canada welcomes the commitment to develop a forest resilience strategy, which is critical given the extensive degradation of forests caused by industrial-scale clearcut logging of primary forests in Canada.

Nature Canada is Canada’s voice for nature. For 85 years, Nature Canada has helped protect nearly 144 million acres of parks and wildlife areas in Canada and countless species. Today, Nature Canada represents a network of over 250,000 members and supporters and more than 1,200 nature organizations.

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For more information, contact:

Scott Mullenix, Director of Communications
613-562-3447 x230
media@naturecanada.ca