Reports - Boreal Conservation

1. 50 percent of Canada's total land area is frozen - permafrost stores carbon through a freeze-thaw process that slowly moves organic material into the ground. The Canadian Boreal Region includes large areas of carbon rich permafrost. Worldwide, permafrost stores 400 billion metric tons of carbon.
2. Canada has the largest area of peatlands in the world - peatlands encompass 12 percent of Canada's land area with high concentrations in Manitoba. Peatlands store at least six times as much carbon per hectare as forested mineral soils. Peat is formed by decaying organic matter which accumulates in wet and boggy areas - often called muskeg in Canada. Peatlands store carbon for thousands of years and also purify water by absorbing pollutants.
3. Globally almost 30 percent of soil organic carbon is in the Boreal and Tundra ecosystems - these ecosystems hold 90 per cent of organic carbon in all Canadian soils. Organic carbon is deposited in soils from the decay of plant matter and soils rich in organic carbon are found throughout the Canadian Boreal Forest.

In the August 17, 2007 edition of the Journal, Science, researchers from the World Land Trust and the University of Leeds in England published a report that concludes that the restoration and protection of forests would result in a much greater reduction of the carbon load in the atmosphere than dedicating vast tracts of land to "energy crops".

• $448-billion - Annual value of ecosystem services product for the Mackenzie River region
• $42-billion - Annual value of gross domestic product including mining and energy for Mackenzie
• $1.9-billion - CBI's estimate of the annual value of carbon dioxide sequestered by the Boreal ecosystem in the Mackenzie region

In December 2006, CPAWS Wildlands League released a report, Roads: More than lines on a map. The report is intended to provide the public and decision makers with key information on the problem of roads and possible solutions by depicting the need to maintain our shrinking areas of intact forest habitat with what seems to be constant demand for new roads.

1. Convene a national leaders' conference on the future of Canada's boreal.
2. Establish a boreal Network of Centre of Excellence.
3. Improve the capacity for climate change adaptation in the boreal.
4. Expand the use of fiscal incentives to promote conservation by resource industries in the boreal.
5. Strengthen integrated landscape planning and management through innovative approaches.
6. Strengthen institutional arrangements for more effective engagement of Aboriginal peoples.
7. Support capacity building in Aboriginal communities.

• Advancing the conservation of natural capital in the boreal in balance with development is an investment by Canadians in their own future;
• the boreal is highly important to Canada and the world - ecologically, economically and socially;
• that the question of the boreal's future deserves the attention of the most senior political, corporate, Aboriginal and community leaders;
• a short list of key international and domestic factors will affect the future of the boreal, in particular world commodity prices and trade policies, the impacts of market-driven approaches in innovation and green consumerism, domestic policy trends, Aboriginal involvement and global climate change

• conservation planning for whole landscapes;
• partnerships with industry on working landscapes;
• community stewardship; conservation of marine ecosystems; and
• implementing a national framework for action.

One of the key issues also noted by the NRTEE that underlines the urgency of conservation and protection in the boreal is the failure of planning to keep pace with other pressures on the landscape in Canada; decisions about industrial development are being made more rapidly and in advance of conservation planning.

Boreal Initiatives