By: Martin Olszynski and Brett Favaro
PDF Version: Recent Analysis Shows Canada was Losing Fish Habitat Before 2012 Budget Bills
Matter commented on: Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans’ Review of the Fisheries Act RSC 1985, c F-14
Back in October of last year, we appeared before the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans (FOPO) in the context of its review of the 2012 changes to the habitat protection provisions of the Fisheries Act. Shortly after our appearance it occurred to us that it would be useful, using the best evidence available in the short time that was left, to provide FOPO – indeed all Canadians – with some quantifiable estimate of the state of fish habitat protection in Canada (the deadline for public submissions was November 30th, 2016).
Consequently, we returned to Professor Olszynski’s original access to information request from 2015 that provided the evidentiary basis for his article “From ‘Badly Wrong’ to Worse: An Empirical Analysis of Canada’s New Approach to Fish Habitat Protection Laws” (2015) 28(1) J Env L & Prac 1). Briefly, Professor Olszynski obtained all of the subsection 35(2) authorizations issued by DFO’s two largest regions (Pacific, Central and Arctic) over a six-month period (May 1 to October 1) for the years 2012, 2013, 2014. Generally speaking, each authorization contains information about the project proponent, project type (e.g. a bridge, a mine, a dam), project location, the size and kind of impacts to habitat, and the amount of compensation or offsetting habitat required – if any. We recorded the total area that each project was authorized to impact (in m2), as well as the total amount of compensation habitat required. Of the 86 authorizations in 2012, eight authorized impacts that were not described in terms of area (e.g. the proponent was authorized to destroy 1,500 eelgrass plants, or to dewater a stream killing all its fish); these were excluded from our analysis, leaving us with 78 authorizations.