Department: Environment and Climate Change Canada

Youth employment programs to build a more equitable and inclusive future for conservation (Target 22)

As communities, businesses, and industries increasingly integrate nature-based solutions to address global challenges like climate change and biodiversity loss, conservation experience is becoming crucial for youth entering the workforce. Historically, the conservation sector in Canada has lacked diversity, but that trend is changing. Indigenous people, racialized youth, youth with disabilities, and those facing employment barriers are finding opportunities in conservation careers. Investing in youth employment programs can yield local community and economic benefits, enhanced ecosystem wellbeing, career paths for youth, and improvements in mental and physical health, fostering inclusion and belonging.

The Green Budget Coalition is pleased with the proposed allocation of $351.2 million in 2025-26 for Canada Summer Jobs and the Youth Employment and Skills Strategy (YESS) program to support 90,000 youth jobs, as well as the government’s intention to launch consultations for a Youth Climate Corps program. However, the effectiveness of the YESS program is limited by specific requirements, such as restricting full-time terms to a maximum of three months and eligibility criteria preventing the extension of work terms.

The Green Budget Coalition recommends that the government continue and enhance support for conservation and other organizations by addressing these limitations.

Recommended Investments and Improvements [ESDC with PC and ECCC]:

  • For the Youth Employment and Skills Strategy and Canada Summer Jobs programs:
    • Amend the program funding rules to allow all work terms to be at least six months long, full-time, at geographically-appropriate wage levels;
    • Amend the program participant eligibility rules to permit the extension of currently funded positions to six months before requiring participants to transition to new roles;
    • $80 million in 2025-26 to enable 20% of work terms to be extended to 6-8 months, while maintaining the same number of hires; and
    • $500 million per year, ongoing, starting in 2026-2027, to create permanent funding allowing 25% of young people hired to be employed for roughly 6-8 months.
  • Collaborate with environmental NGOs and funding communities to increase match funding and expand the reach and benefits of these programs for youth employment in the environmental sector.

See also recommendations for the Youth Climate Corps in Sustainable jobs for workers and communities, earlier in this document.

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National Wildlife Habitat Conservation Stamp (Target 19)

Recommendation:

Increase the price of the Canadian Wildlife Habitat Conservation Stamp to $20. [ECCC]

Similar to the US Federal Duck Stamp, the Canadian Wildlife Habitat Conservation Stamp (“the Stamp”)—which migratory game bird hunters are required to purchase with their federal hunting permit—raises funds for conservation and draws attention to the importance of wildlife and their habitats. Since the inception of the Stamp Program in 1984, stamp and print sales have directly provided over $64 million for wildlife habitat conservation across Canada.

However, the price of the Stamp ($8.50) has not changed since 1991. With CPI-adjustments, an $8.50 Stamp in 1991 would cost almost $16.00 in 2023. Inflation and a decline in the number of waterfowl hunters over this period have significantly impacted the benefits that Stamp funds create for wetlands and wildlife habitat conservation, including migratory game bird habitat.

In the past three years, the Stamp program received 136 conservation project applications, demonstrating the tremendous public support for the program. Unfortunately, due to limited stamp sale revenues, only 84 of the 136 projects were funded. Despite this, the 84 projects leveraged $17.3 million; conserved, enhanced, or restored 146,742 acres of habitat; and involved 350,000 Canadians. Based on current Stamp sales (approximately 164,000 annually), this recommended price increase has the potential to create the following additional benefits over each three-year period: leverage $41 million to deliver nearly 200 conservation projects across Canada; conserve, enhance, or restore 345,000 acres of habitat; and involve 820,000 Canadians.

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Freshwater management (Target 11)

The sustainable management and stewardship of Canada’s freshwater environments is one of the great challenges of our time, and one of the most important means by which Canada can demonstrate global natural resource leadership.

Recent investments in freshwater and the establishment of the Canada Water Agency, while encouraging, should be seen as a first step towards a coordinated national approach to protecting all of Canada’s freshwater resources, which are central to our nation’s health and prosperity. Especially to meet commitments made under the Freshwater Challenge and KMGBF, ongoing investments in freshwater are needed to protect and restore our large lakes and river systems, and the surrounding watersheds and wetlands that support them.

Total Recommended Investment:

$675 million over five years, and then $200 million over the following five years (2030-2035)

  • $475 million over five years to expand freshwater management practices nationally:
    • $280 million in additional funding for the Freshwater Action Plan to improve water quality, manage water quantity, and protect aquatic biodiversity through implementing watershed action plans and in-water actions nationally, starting with:
      • Fraser River
      • Mackenzie River

        Investments should be prioritized through a risk-based analysis using science and research and in collaboration with Indigenous peoples. [ECCC]
    • $195 million to address the funding gap in the rest of the country, to cover regions outside of the waterbodies identified as nationally significant, for projects that address issues including climate mitigation, climate adaptation, truth and reconciliation through capacity building and partnerships with Indigenous peoples, habitat restoration, water technology and innovation, community-based water monitoring, fish population recovery, planning, and natural infrastructure. [ECCC]
      • Ottawa River
      • Columbia Basin
  • $400 million over ten years to build on the BC Watershed Security Fund to address water quantity and quality challenges and improve freshwater environments for Pacific salmon and steelhead in the Fraser River Basin and other priority watersheds (coordinate this funding with the Pacific Salmon Strategy Initiative). [ECCC]

Many of Canada’s vast freshwater resources are located on Indigenous lands, whose people have stewarded these resources since time immemorial. Their inherent rights, traditional knowledge and understanding of these ecosystems must be a core component of any plans or actions taken. Additional funding for freshwater ecosystems should directly support both Indigenous-led water stewardship efforts and progress towards the implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in Canada.

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Ensuring the multi-million dollar growth opportunity of sustainable shellfish and seaweed farming

Shellfish and seaweed farming (oysters, mussels, scallops, kelp, clams) is poised to grow by 40% over the next five years if the Canadian Shellfish Sanitation Program (CSSP) is supported and adequately funded to provide the necessary oversight to ensure that seafarms operate, shellfish are harvested, and products are tested for safety before entering the market. A thriving shellfish and marine plant sea farming sector diversifies our seafood sector, offers opportunities for business ownership, coastal jobs, reconciliation in the blue economy, sustainable food, and contributes to the restoration of marine ecosystems.

However, underfunding of the Canadian Shellfish Sanitation Program is now one of the critical limiting factors preventing our coastal communities from realizing the promise of sustainable shellfish and seaweed farming. Thousands of kilometers of coastline perfect for shellfish farming and harvesting are unclassified or closed to new farms or expansions, not because these waters are actually contaminated, but simply because the CSSP lacks the capacity to undertake the required water testing. Hundreds of current harvesting sites are at risk of closure as the departments are forced to reduce their testing areas due to ever dwindling resources. There has been no increase in permanent funding to this required program in twenty years. Canadian communities and industry are losing market opportunities. Adequate funding and modernization of the CSSP is even more important now as shifting ocean temperatures impact the timing and safety of shellfish harvests and require more frequent testing to ensure products can get to market. The CSSP needs to be recognized and supported not only as important for Canadian consumer safety, but as a key enabler of coastal jobs, small businesses, and investment confidence.

Fortunately, with a relatively small investment, this problem can be solved and communities on all coasts will see the boom. In 2022, the latest federal government review of the CSSP reiterated that the program does not have sufficient funding to operate as it should, “to ensure that health risks are minimized, the shellfish industry remains strong, and stakeholder and partner needs are served appropriately”. It recommended a minimum of $30 million annually, while the CSSP is only slated to receive $10 million annually in the coming years.

Recommended Investment:

$20 million per year, ongoing [ECCC, DFO, CFIA]

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Data collection to support regulatory evaluation of pesticides (Target 7)

The PMRA often lacks data on environmental concentrations and use patterns (e.g., information on the timing, location, and quantity of pesticide applications) for the pesticides it is responsible for evaluating and regulating. This is an unacceptable gap. Water and use monitoring should be expanded and extended beyond the limited initiatives first announced as pilots in 2021 and funded for two more years in Budget 2024. The collection of these data over a longer term is also required to measure Canada’s progress towards meeting Target 7 of the Global Biodiversity Framework (reducing pesticide risks by 50% by 2030).

In June 2024, the government published draft regulatory changes to strengthen the consideration of species at risk in pesticide risk assessments. The Green Budget Coalition recommends that the Canadian Wildlife Service be funded to lead this work, and to assess and track the overall risks of pesticides to biodiversity.

Recommended Investment:

$100 million over five years

  • $5 million top-up in 2025, then $40 million over five years beginning in 2026 (and renewed in 2031) to expand and extend the new pesticide water monitoring program. [PMRA, in collaboration with ECCC]
  • $25 million over five years to launch a system for collecting and publishing pesticide sales and use data at the local/regional scale, plus $5 million in 2025 to design and develop a publicly- accessible portal for communicating real-time pesticide use data. [PMRA, in collaboration with AAFC]
  • $25 million over five years to support the consideration of species at risk in pesticide assessments and to assess and monitor the overall risks to biodiversity from pesticide use in Canada. [ECCC]

Cost recovery. The Green Budget Coalition also supports the PMRA’s proposed increase in fees for pest control products and recommends: increasing the proportion of costs to be recovered; and expanding cost recovery to include a wider range of programs such as water monitoring activities and use data collection.

See also Sustainable Agriculture Strategy: Cultivating success, with related recommendations for reducing risks from pesticides, earlier in this document.

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