News

As a voluntary initiative, the UN Global Compact provides a framework for building social legitimacy of business and markets. Companies are required to align with ten principles on human rights, the environment and anti-corruption.

To uphold the initiative's integrity the UN Global Compact removed firms including Ernst & Young, L'Oreal Argentina, and Mitsubishi Motors Cebu Corporation. Currently, 184 of the 5,982 participants are at risk of being de-listed for missing deadlines.

Tembec Inc, which operates the pulp mill in Pine Falls Manitoba, is among the companies de-listed in June 2008. The company is currently preparing to report to the UN to continue their commitment to the Global Compact.

Paris, a city known for traffic congestion, is celebrating the one-year anniversary of Vélib' bike share program. Subsidized by advertising, the bikes are cheap to rent and highly accessible with more than 1,450 self-service rental stations located every 300 yards throughout the city.

In the first year, there have been 27.5 million trips in the city of roughly 2.1 million people, many of them for daily commutes. On average, there are 120,000 trips a day.

Copenhagen, Vancouver, Barcelona, Milan, Stockholm, Washington D.C., and Amsterdam have all implemented bike share programs. New York City has recently announced its intention to investigate the feasibility of instituting such a program to reduces vehicle emissions and ease congestion.

The North American Monarch Conservation Plan identifies deforestation of winter habitats in the south among main risk factors to Monarch flyways and breeding habitats. Current conservation actions in each country are also summarized.

The plan provides a detailed overview of the monarch's lifecycle and unique multigenerational migratory pattern - considered an endangered biological phenomenon. The CEC website offers an interactive Google Earth map of the Monarch's range.

In other initiatives the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve in Mexico was listed a World Heritage Site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO). The reserve protects over wintering colonies of Monarch butterflies that travel thousands of kilometers from breeding locations in the US & Canada each year.

The David Suzuki Foundation (DSF) report, Provincial Power Play: Breaking Away from Federal Inaction on Climate Change, was released July 16, 2008 at the Council of the Federation meeting in Quebec City. The report looks at provincial and territorial action on climate change, compares their greenhouse gas emissions, assesses their climate change plans and evaluates their records. Manitoba Wildlands contributed information and analysis for evaluation of Manitoba's climate change plan.

The DSF evaluation also highlights the fact that Canada's federal climate change plan does not measure up. It argues most provinces have better climate change plans than our federal government, stronger GHG emissions reduction targets and stronger policies to achieve them.

The David Suzuki Foundation is calling on the federal government to follow the lead of the provinces and set strong, national standards across Canada.

• Collaborate with scientists, First Nation and Métis communities to map and permanently protect interconnected network of conservation lands across the Far North
• Support local land-use planning for First Nation communities that precedes development decisions
• Work with northern communities and resource industries to create a broad plan for sustainable development, including resource benefit sharing with First Nations communities for projects that receive community consent
• Review the Mining Act, introduce legislation in the upcoming session and put in place new mining rules in 2009 that respect First Nations rights and ensure new mining development in the Far North will require early consultation and accommodation with local Aboriginal communities.

First Nations leaders in Ontario praised the government's approach. "This is good news for the people of Nishnawbe Aski, as it will require that First Nations be fully involved in resource development in our traditional territory," said Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) Grand Chief Stan Beardy.

Scientists and Canadian environmental groups expressed their strong support for Premier Dalton McGuinty's science-based leadership. Janet Sumner, Executive Director of CPAWS Wildlands League said, "Today's announcement fulfills the Premier's promise to protect the Boreal Forest by doing Land Use Planning before large scale industrial development."

Tursujuq provincial park along Nunavik's eastern Hudson's Bay coast has yet to be permanently protected but environmental groups, including the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, are calling for an expansion. The proposed addition is more than 10,000 square kilometers in size and includes the entire Nastapoka River's headwaters and chain of inland lakes.

Hydro Quebec has no current plans but is interested in future hydroelectric opportunities along Little Whale River and the Nastapoka River, which flow in and around Tursujuq. A hydro dam on the Nastapoka River could produce 1,000 megawatts of power - but would require power lines and access routes to cut through the park.

Tursujuq will be Nunavik's third provincial park and is located along the transition zone between the boreal forest and tundra. Endangered beluga whales gather in the Nastapoka River's estuary during summer and it is home to a population of rare landlocked salmon.

Ontario is the newest member of Western Climate Initiative, which includes Manitoba, British Columbia, Quebec and seven U.S. states. Launched in 2007, the WCI is the largest green partnership working to design a cap and trade system for carbon credits and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at least 15 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. (Each jurisdiction's targets to be met.) Seventy-five percent of Canada's population lives in Western Climate Initiative member provinces.

Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty said his province is "proud to be welcomed into this important organization of climate-change leaders."

Earlier this year, six members of the Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI) First Nation near Thunder Bay and two members of the Ardoch Algonquin First Nation in eastern Ontario were jailed when they protested private companies' activities on their traditional lands.

The panel of three judges said jailing native leaders emphasized the "estrangement of aboriginal peoples from the Canadian justice system" and concluded that jailing First Nations leadership in disputes between the Crown and Aboriginal people should only be used as a last resort. The appeals court also dismissed thousands of dollars in fines against the protesters, noting that the bands had already been subject to huge bills by the legal process.

Ontario's Northern Development and Mines Minister and Aboriginal Affairs Minister also supported the appeals court decision.

Mayor Kitty Piercy of Eugene, Oregon introduced the resolution that supports environmentally sustainable energy not from "dirty" tar sands. It calls for purchasing standards and guidelines to track the life-cycle impact of different fossil fuels.

"In the last few years, U.S. mayors have come out as leaders on environmental initiatives, specifically in the fight to stop global warming," said Susan Casey-Lefkowitz a senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, NRDC.

Oil extraction from tar sands releases three times as much greenhouse gases as conventional oil and threatens Canada's Boreal forest. Production from the Alberta oilsands is projected to triple from 1.2 million barrels to 3.5 million barrels a day by 2015.

The US Mayors Conference also passed a resolution to phase out use of bottle water in their city operations.

Climate change and the environment were main themes of the meeting but the leaders were widely criticized for failing to deepen their commitments to greenhouse gas reductions with mid term targets. The G8 leaders called for a global reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50% by 2050, but also didn't specify a base year (for example, 50% of 1990 emission levels).

Yvo de Boer, who leads the UN negotiations to forge a new climate change treaty, was critical of the lack of a baseline for the 50% reduction target, and that the G8 said nothing about making that goal part of a legally binding convention.

On the final day of the Summit, eight other "major developing economies" from developing countries China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa joined the G8 leaders. These countries refused to accept the G8's vague long-term targets. In a statement, developing nations called on developed countries to take the lead in adopting deep emissions reductions targets. They pledged developing countries would take on quantitative emissions reductions as long as they were facilitated through financing and support for technology transfer from developed nations.

CPDFN lawsuit in June 2008, came after the Alberta government leased land in the heart of their traditional territory around Christina and Winifred Lakes to MEG Energy Corporation. The First Nation asserts the government did not uphold their constitutional duty to consult with them on the Christina Lake Regional Project Phase 3.

"For years, we have told Alberta and industry of our concerns about the erosion of our rights through ever-increasing development and the lack of proper planning for resource development. Yet Alberta has done almost nothing to change the way they regulate this development. If anything, Alberta has sped up the pace of its approvals," said Chief Vern Janvier of CPDFN.

Beaver Lake Cree Nation and the Woodland Cree have filed similar lawsuits. The Courts rulings will have implications for First Nations and all resource developers in the oil sands and across Alberta. The cases also raise the need for regional land use planning and proper impact assessment of existing and planned development.