Progress report on the Species at Risk Act: May 2009

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Prepared for the Parliamentary Five-Year Review of the Species at Risk Act

May 2009

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. The Species at Risk Act
  3. Actions to Implement SARA
  4. Initial Accomplishments
  5. Path Forward
  6. Management of Species at Risk in Canada: Milestones

1. Introduction

This report provides an overview of the implementation of the Species at Risk Act (SARA). It has been prepared for parliamentarians who will be participating in the first Parliamentary five-year review of the Act.

2. The Species at Risk Act

SARA came into force in 2003Footnote1 to prevent wildlife species from becoming extinct or being extirpated and to support their recovery. The Act legislated requirements for the assessment, protection and recovery of species at risk in Canada, actions that had previously been carried out largely on a voluntary basis.Footnote2

Prior to SARA, the federal government’s basic approach to the protection and recovery of species at risk was collaborative, with a focus on protecting habitat in cooperation with the provinces and the territories, and on encouraging stewardship by Aboriginal organizations, conservation organizations, fishers, landowners, resource users and others.

In the 1990s, Canadian action was increasingly shaped by formal international and national commitments. In 1992, Canada ratified the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity, pledging to conserve biological diversity, to use its components sustainably and to share equitably the benefits arising from the use of genetic resources. In 1996, the federal government published the Canadian Biodiversity Strategy. The subsequent Accord for the Protection of Species at Risk set out federal, provincial and territorial commitments to identify species at risk in Canada, protect their habitats and develop recovery plans.

3. Actions to Implement SARA

The implementation of SARA in its first five years has involved defining and putting in place governance structures, policies and procedures to enable the effective and consistent implementation of the Act. It has also required changes to many programs that predated the Act and that had been developed over several decades. At the same time as the federal government put these foundational measures into place, it also had to address requirements under the Act for the 233 species that were listed on Schedule 1 of SARA when the Act came into force.

Governance and Accountability

The responsibility for implementing SARA is shared:Footnote3

Various governance structures and advisory bodies support the implementation of SARA and related federal programs:

The federal government also works with the provinces and territories through other mechanisms. For example, the Aquatic Species at Risk Task Group was established by the Canadian Council of Fisheries and Aquaculture Ministers.

In further recognition of the importance of cooperation to the conservation of wildlife under SARA, negotiations are underway to develop bilateral agreements on species at risk with all provinces and territories. The agreements will set out shared objectives and commitments to cooperate on specific initiatives. Agreements have already been signed with British Columbia, Quebec and Saskatchewan, and several other agreements are nearing completion.

The conservation of species at risk on lands under comprehensive land claims agreements requires consultation with a wildlife management board or other relevant body established under the land claims agreement. To that end, a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed with the Nunavut Wildlife Management Board focuses on harmonizing activities under SARA with those under the Nunavut Land Claims Agreement.

The departments responsible for SARA also work closely with other federal departments and agencies to ensure that obligations under SARA are met on federal lands, including through the Interdepartmental Recovery Fund.

SARA also contains various measures to provide the public with information about decisions and actions taken under the Act. The Species at Risk Public Registry provides Internet access to SARA-related documents, and offers a forum for submitting comments on draft documents. The Minister of the Environment must submit an annual report on the administration of the Act to Parliament, and must report to Parliament every five years on the general status of wildlife species at risk in Canada. SARA also requires the Minister to convene a Round Table at least every two years to solicit recommendations on the protection of wildlife species at risk in Canada. The first Minister’s Round Table was held in December 2006, and the second was held in December 2008.

Government Funding

The implementation of SARA was supported by funding in the 2000, 2003 and 2007 budgets:Footnote5

Policy Development

When SARA came into force, 190 of the 233 species previously assessed by COSEWIC were listed on Schedule 1 of the Act as threatened, endangered or extirpated. The listing triggered obligations to protect these 190 species and to prepare a recovery strategy and action plan for them. For the 43 species that were listed on Schedule 1 as special concern, obligations were triggered to prepare management plans. The implementation of these obligations received the bulk of the federal government’s attention in the first few years of work under the Act. This experience demonstrated the need to develop systematic guidance to support the use of SARA as part of coordinated federal-provincial-territorial efforts to conserve and protect species at risk.

In June 2007, federal, provincial and territorial deputy ministers responsible for wildlife endorsed the National Framework for Species at Risk Conservation. The Framework provides a set of common principles, objectives and overarching approaches. The specific objectives of the Framework are to

The federal government is finalizing policies to guide its actions under each of the five related components of the species at risk conservation cycle that is embodied in SARA: species status assessment, protection, recovery planning, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation. The policies describe the roles and responsibilities of relevant federal departments and explain the expected contributions to the implementation of SARA by the provinces and territories, as well as by other stakeholders. It is expected that the policies will continue to be refined and updated as more experience is gained in implementing SARA.

The Species at Risk Conservation Cycle

4. Initial Accomplishments

Banff Springs Snail and the SARA Cycle

The Banff Springs Snail is an endemic species found only on federal land under Parks Canada jurisdiction. Protection and recovery efforts for the Banff Springs Snail have undergone the full SARA cycle: assessment, listing and protection, recovery planning, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation.

Assessment of Species

SARA separates the process for conducting scientific assessments of the conservation status of wildlife species from the decision to add a species to the List of Wildlife Species at Risk. This enables scientists to provide independent scientific assessments while reserving for elected officials the role of deciding whether or not to add the species to the List triggering the protection provided by the Act.

Using internationally recognized criteria, COSEWIC provides its assessments of the status of wildlife species and reasons for it to the Minister of the Environment and to the CESCC. There are now 572 species in various COSEWIC risk categories, including Endangered, Threatened, Special Concern and Extirpated.

COSEWIC has worked to ensure that its assessment process meets the requirements of the Act. In anticipation of the enactment of SARA, COSEWIC updated its assessment criteria, basing its changes on the criteria used by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN). COSEWIC developed a procedure for incorporating community knowledge into its species status assessments. A subcommittee on Aboriginal Traditional Knowledge (ATK)Footnote6 developed a draft process and protocol guidelines for including ATK in COSEWIC assessments.

Polar Bear and ATK

In April 2008, COSEWIC announced its reassessment of the Polar Bear as a species of special concern. A greater effort was made to include ATK in its assessment, and a greater and more consistent inclusion of ATK was presented. Other species assessments in which ATK was used to some degree include the Peary Caribou, Chinook Salmon (Okanagan population), the Beluga Whale, and the Wolverine.

Listing and Legal Protection

SARA specifies a systematic decision-making process by which the federal government must consider COSEWIC assessments and decide whether to add a species to Schedule 1 (the List of Wildlife Species at Risk).

Listing decisions are subject to the Cabinet Directive on Streamlining Regulation, which requires consultations with affected parties and a description of the socio-economic impacts of the decision. Listing decisions are published in the Canada Gazette, and include regulatory impact analysis statements. Explanatory notes are published if a species is not added to Schedule 1 or is referred back to COSEWIC.

The decision to list a species as extirpated, endangered or threatened triggers legal protections. In particular, SARA makes it an offence to

These prohibitions automatically apply to

For listed species other than aquatic species and migratory birds on non-federal lands in a province or territory, SARA recognizes that provinces and territories have the first opportunity to protect the species through their laws. If the provinces or territories concerned do not act, SARA provides a safety net that permits the Governor in Council, on the recommendation of the Minister of the Environment, to order the application of SARA prohibitions in the province or territory concerned for a given species. The Minister must make this recommendation if, after consultation with the provincial or territorial minister concerned, the Minister finds that the species or the residence of its individuals are not effectively protected. The federal government has not invoked these safety net provisions to date.

Ministers may also enter into agreements or issue permits authorizing activities affecting listed species that would otherwise be prohibited under SARA. The departments have established permitting systems for activities such as scientific research related to the conservation of a listed species and fishing or other activity that incidentally affects a listed species without jeopardizing its survival or recovery.

Compliance promotion and enforcement activities support the prohibitions. Compliance promotion encourages compliance through activities that help build awareness of legal requirements.Footnote7

Spotted, Northern and Atlantic Wolffish

In Newfoundland and Labrador, communication and education activities, as well as collaboration with fishers to promote the live release of wolffish, demonstrated the importance of stakeholder engagement in promoting compliance to achieve protection and recovery objectives.

Enforcement is undertaken by wildlife enforcement officers, fishery officers and park wardens trained and designated under SARA to monitor, inspect, investigate and enforce the prohibitions of the Act. In most cases, these officials carry out enforcement activities under SARA in addition to their enforcement duties under other federal laws, such as the Migratory Birds Convention Act, 1994, the Fisheries Act and the Canada National Parks Act. By 2007, 45 wildlife enforcement officers, over 600 fisheries officers and 185 park wardensFootnote8 had been trained and designated under SARA.

Northern Abalone

In April 2007, three people convicted in British Columbia of illegally harvesting Northern Abalone were sentenced under SARA, and faced the stiffest penalties ever exacted. Such enforcement efforts strengthen the overall effectiveness of protection and recovery measures.

Environmental assessment also supports the protection of species at risk. When an environmental assessment of a project is required, as under the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, for example, SARA requires the identification of the adverse effects of the project on all listed wildlife species and their critical habitats, and if the project is carried out, requires that measures be taken to avoid or lessen those effects and that they be monitored. The measures must be taken in a way that is consistent with any applicable recovery strategy and action plans. The 2004 Environmental Assessment Best Practice Guide for Wildlife at Risk in Canada outlines a national approach for assessing the consequences of proposed action and for making decisions consistent with the protection and recovery of species at risk.

Recovery Planning

Species recovery includes a wide range of measures to restore populations of species at risk. SARA requires the competent ministers to prepare Recovery Strategies and Action Plans for all species listed on Schedule 1 as extirpated, endangered or threatened for which recovery is deemed technically and biologically feasible.

Ministers work cooperatively to develop recovery strategies with others, including provincial and territorial governments when species are found in their jurisdictions, and in cooperation with wildlife management boards, Aboriginal groups, landowners, resource users and any other potentially affected parties. The recovery teams formed to develop Recovery Strategies are typically composed of experts from universities, conservation groups, industry and government.

Recovery Strategies must identify threats to the species and their habitats, identify critical habitat to the extent possible based on the best available information, and set recovery goals. The identification of the critical habitat that is necessary for the survival or recovery of a listed species is intended to guide recovery planning. SARA grants various powers to allow the federal government to protect critical habitat identified in recovery strategies and action plans against destruction.

Recovery planning requires extensive consultation and cooperation with a wide range of governments and affected parties. These consultations can be complex and time-consuming in the case of species that are broadly distributed or that affect remote and northern communities.

Piping Plover and Critical Habitat

Critical habitat identification proved to be a challenge in the case of recovery efforts for the Piping Plover, which involved working through issues pertaining to the scale at which critical habitat should be identified and the cooperation, consultation and time frame requirements imposed by SARA. Similar issues exist for many other species, including aquatic species.

Following the development of the Recovery Strategies, SARA requires the competent minister to develop an Action Plan for the recovery of each listed species. Each plan should follow the approach and timelines set out in its species recovery strategy. Where critical habitat is not identified in the recovery strategy, it must be identified in the action plan to the extent possible based on best available information.

Where a wildlife species is listed as a species of special concern, SARA also requires ministers to prepare management plans for the species and its habitat. Of the species listed under Schedule 1, these are in the lowest risk category. A management plan sets out measures to conserve a species and its habitat, and is developed in much the same way as a recovery strategy.

Implementation

Many conservation and recovery actions for species at risk, including the existence of recovery teams and actions undertaken in partnership with various stakeholders, predated SARA. Many of these continue to be key aspects of implementation, along with new actions established under the Act.

Plains Bison

Although the Plains Bison was not listed under SARA, it was successfully reintroduced into the Grasslands National Park, an achievement that represents an important recovery effort for the species and provides grazing essential to the restoration of the endangered native prairie grassland ecosystem.

Successful Recovery of the Sea Otter

After being extirpated in Canada, Sea Otter were reintroduced on the west coast of Vancouver Island in 1969-72. Significant improvement in the population of the Sea Otter is evidenced by the downgrading of status in successive COSEWIC assessments: endangered in 1978 and 1986, threatened in 1996 and 2000, species of special concern in 2007.

In most cases, effective recovery effort involves a wide cross-section of Canadian society. Cooperative work on recovery implementation with provinces and territories and wildlife management boards has been supported by formal agreements. Work with other stakeholders has involved several stewardship funds and programs, as well as outreach and educational efforts.

Critical Habitat and Protection

The federal government has supported stewardship actions under SARA by improving knowledge about the distribution and abundance of many species. Efforts have also been made to strengthen the scientific capacity to assess the impact of threats and learn about effective technologies for mitigating threats and protecting habitat. This new information is enabling the federal government and its partners to design more effective protection and recovery efforts.

Recovery Activities

Recovery activities supported to date include habitat restoration projects, changes in fishing patterns and methods, changes in land use, negotiation of conservation agreements with landowners, signage or fencing projects, captive breeding of species at risk and their release into the wild, land acquisition, captive broodstock programs, reintroductions, enhancement and naturalization of riparian habitat, reduction of agricultural waste, rescue of entangled marine animals, and removal of ghost nets and illegal nets.

SARA enables the federal government to encourage the conservation efforts of individual Canadians and communities through provisions for funding programs, conservation agreements and joint programs.

Outreach and Volunteer Stewardship

A Parks Canada project in Kejimkujik National Park encourages park visitors, local community members and Aboriginal communities to work with scientists and stewardship coordinators in support of recovery efforts for species at risk in the area. Over 230 people have been involved, donating over 10 000 hours.

Monitoring and Evaluation

Under SARA, the Minister of the Environment reports on the general status of wildlife species in Canada. Wild Species 2005 reported that the status of 70% of the 7732 species assessed was secure.

In addition to five-year reports on the status of wildlife in Canada, SARA requires some additional monitoring and evaluation:

Current monitoring and evaluation activities focus on determining the effectiveness of protection and recovery measures, measuring progress towards achieving recovery or management goals and detecting changes in the status of species.

The July 2006 Formative Evaluation of Species at Risk Programs provided recommendations based on the early implementation of SARA. The December 2006 Minister’s Round Table complemented this with a dialogue among a wide range of groups on how to improve the conservation and recovery of species. The recommendations and responses from these participants contributed to various improvements in the implementation of SARA, including:

The second Minister’s Round Table was held in December 2008 as a forum for dialogue with stakeholders on the conservation and recovery of species at risk in Canada.

5. Path Forward

The first five years of implementation of SARA have been challenging for the departments responsible for the Act. The 233 species that were already listed on Schedule 1 when the Act came into force triggered a significant number of time-bound obligations that the responsible departments needed to complete while concurrently working to develop governance processes and policies to guide decision making under the Act. With formal governance structures and implementation policies now in place and with practices improving, the pace of implementation throughout the SARA cycle is now improving.

The responsible federal departments and all other affected parties and stakeholders still have much to learn, as more and more species move through the SARA cycle and into the action planning and recovery implementation stages.

Ecosystem Approaches

Learning how to use ecosystem and multi-species approaches will be an important part of the path forward. These approaches can make it easier to recognize and address overlaps in species range and needs, positive conservation synergies, interdependencies and potential conflicts, and common underlying problems. There are more than 20 multi-species and area-based ecosystem recovery initiatives underway in Canada. The scientific knowledge, experience and working relationships gained through these efforts will help support expanded use of ecosystem approaches under SARA.

Garry Oak Ecosystem

An ecosystem approach has helped the federal government to address SARA’s requirements for a number of species at risk in the Garry Oak ecosystem of southwestern British Columbia.

Mobilizing Cooperative Efforts for Protection and Recovery

The assessment, protection and recovery of species at risk in Canada have received much more formal and structured attention since SARA was enacted. Ultimately, however, helping species at risk to survive or recover is “everybody’s business,” and the ongoing success of SARA will depend on the actions of governments, Aboriginal peoples, conservation organizations, landowners, fishers, resource users and other interested people across Canada.

Cooperation and coordination with provinces and territories is especially important under SARA. Various provinces and territories have introduced or strengthened their own legislation and, since SARA was passed, there has been a marked increase in provincial and territorial efforts to protect species at risk.

SARA and the Ongoing Conservation Agenda

Finally, by focusing on the species facing the greatest risk of extinction, SARA plays an important role in the overall efforts to conserve biodiversity in Canada. That role will continue to evolve with the ongoing development of integrated approaches that use the powers of SARA in conjunction with the range of other available tools and a broad understanding of ecosystem features, functions, trends and influences. This approach will permit preventive approaches, early intervention and effective conservation of wildlife species at risk and management of ecosystem health and biodiversity in Canada.

Management of Species at Risk in Canada: Milestones

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