On Sept. 9, Mat Jacobson, the Pew Environment Group and Suzann Methot, Canadian Boreal Initiative, will present a motion at the International Union for Conservation of Nature's World Conservation Congress here, commending Quebec for adopting the world's most ambitious commitments to sustainable development.
The policies recognized by this resolution, sponsored by Pew and supported by Quebec's Ministère du Développement durable, de l'Environnement et des Parcs, were adopted as a part of Quebec's Plan Nord and have been endorsed by all of Quebec's major political parties. The resolution would recognize as a global model the policy, which commits to work in partnership with aboriginal communities to protect an area the size of France from industrial activity and maintain sustainable standards on an area of equal size.
The circumpolar boreal forest, one of Earth's largest and arguably least known ecosystems, plays a crucial role in the health of the planet. Rivaling the Amazon in size and ecological importance, Canada's boreal forest supports the world's most extensive network of pure lakes, rivers and wetlands and captures and stores twice as much carbon as tropical forests. It teems with wildlife—including billions of songbirds that migrate across the Americas.