Section 2: Canada Water Agency Overview - Who we are

2.1 CWA Mandate and Legislative Authorities

Mandate

The mandate of the Canada Water Agency (CWA) is to improve freshwater management in Canada by providing leadership, effective collaboration federally, and improved coordination and collaboration with provinces, territories, and Indigenous peoples to proactively address national and regional transboundary freshwater challenges and opportunities.

Mission

The CWA’s mission is to deliver this mandate by leading with excellence in the management and stewardship of fresh water in Canada for the environmental, social, economic, and spiritual wellbeing of Canada and future generations of Canadians through:

• Fostering creativity and whole-of-government approach with federal departments and agencies
• Building partnerships, enhancing trust and participating in reconciliation with First Nations, Métis and Inuit partners
• Advancing meaningful and respectful collaboration with provinces and territories and binational, non-governmental and private sector partners; and
• Using science and data to achieve and report on measurable results

Vision

The CWA’s vision is that fresh water in Canada is safe, clean and well managed for today and for the future.

Values

The CWA team embraces the core values and ethics of the federal public sector:

• Respect for democracy
• Respect for people
• Integrity
• Stewardship; and
• Excellence

To advance these values, CWA employees are committed to:

• A Caring Culture - Building an open, safe, respectful, and inclusive work environment that values diversity, accessibility, and reconciliation and delivers innovative work and tangible results on the management and stewardship of fresh water in Canada.
• Honesty - Ensuring that advice, decisions and actions are principle-based, built on the expertise and advice of employees and collaborators, follow through on commitments, are honest in all interactions, and individually and collectively own decisions made by or on behalf of the agency.
• Communications - Holding regular dialogue at and across all levels for better collective understanding, seeking broader inclusion of all leaders in key discussions, and timely communication of decisions and the reasons behind them to those that may be affected by them.
• Clarity - Providing direction that is outcome-based and as clear, consistent and precise as possible to empower team members.
• Decisiveness - Making timely, scientifically sound, evidence-based decisions using the best available information to inform intelligent and responsible risk taking.
• Thinking Things Through - Investing in project and operational planning, taking a deliberate and methodological approach to decision-making and making better use of the multi-disciplinary experience and expertise within and outside the organization to inform what is done and how it is done.
• Continuous Improvement - Striving to incrementally improve organizational and professional/personal performance in meaningful ways, support experimentation and innovation, seek and be open to feedback and accept that improvement takes time, and perfection is not the goal.

The CWA is organizing its work around five strategic goals to advance its mandate:

1. Provide whole-of-government federal leadership in freshwater policy, management, and stewardship
2. Improve freshwater management, quality, and ecosystem health in Canada in collaboration and coordination with partners and stakeholders
3. Partner with First Nations, Inuit and Métis to improve transboundary freshwater management, quality, and ecosystem health
4. Enable informed decision-making by leveraging freshwater data, science, and reporting; and
5. Build a resilient and regionally responsive national organization headquartered in Winnipeg that is accountable to Canadians

Legislative Framework

Freshwater management in Canada is a shared responsibility across four orders of government: federal, Indigenous, provincial or territorial, and regional or local. The federal Minister of Environment has a lead role in freshwater responsibilities of the federal government as set out in the legislative framework described below. Other federal ministers have freshwater-related responsibilities set out in other legislation (see further details under 1.2). Both the CWA and ECCC implement the Minister of Environment’s freshwater responsibilities.

The Canada Water Agency Act establishes the Canada Water Agency “for the purpose of assisting the Minister in exercising or performing the Minister’s powers, duties and functions in relation to fresh water under any Act of Parliament, including the Department of the Environment Act and the Canada Water Act.”

• The Department of the Environment Act provides that the Minister of Environment has powers, duties and functions that extend to and include all matters over which Parliament has jurisdiction, not by law assigned to any other department, board or agency of the Government of Canada, relating to water (among other matters).
• The Canada Water Act provides an enabling framework for freshwater collaboration among federal, provincial and territorial governments, including consultation, agreements, and programs.

ECCC also conducts freshwater activities pursuant to the Department of the Environment Act and the Canada Water Act. The following legislation is also related to fresh water and implementation is led by ECCC:

• Section 36(3) of the Fisheries Act
• Migratory Birds Convention Act, 1994
• Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999
• International River Improvements Act; and
• Lake of the Woods Control Board Act

2.2 President’s Biography

2.3 Organizational Chart

Figure 1

2.4 Finances Overview

The Canada Water Agency came into force on October 15, 2024, with deemed appropriations of $52M for the remainder of 2024-2025. In 2025-2026 the Agency's budget is to be $84.8M.

Table 1: Canada Water Agency Deemed Appropriations  

2.5 Human Resources Overview

At the end of January 2025, the workforce was composed of approximately 158 employees^{Footnote 1}  located in the headquarters in Winnipeg, MB, and in regional offices across Canada. It is anticipated that the CWA will include approximately 220 FTEs at full capacity.

Figure 2: Canada Water Agency Staffing Distribution across Canada^{Footnote **}