Alberta rebukes $3.8 billion federal nature strategy

OTTAWA — Alberta is not happy about a newly announced federal nature strategy, saying it will impose burdensome and unconstitutional land-use restrictions on the province. 

Alberta Environment Minister Grant Hunter said on Tuesday that he was concerned by Prime Minister Mark Carney’s sweeping pledge to protect at least 1.6 million square kilometres of land over the next four years, bringing Canada in line with a United Nations-backed push to designate 30 per cent of Earth’s land as protected areas by 2030.

Hunter said the federal initiative could threaten Alberta’s economy by imposing overly stringent federal conservation conditions on lands that are already protected by the province, making such lands off limits to sustainable agriculture and other productive activities.

“Federal reporting measures do not capture the full picture, focusing on narrow definitions of protected land while excluding broader actively managed landscapes and only recognizing lands permanently dedicated to biodiversity conservation,” wrote Hunter in a statement.

Carney said in an announcement near Gatineau Park last week that he was launching a $3.8-billion national strategy to protect nature and biodiversity. The plan would more than double protected lands from 14 per cent to 30 per cent by 2030 and created at least 10 new national parks.

“Nature is at the heart of Canada, it is at the heart of our identity,” said Carney. “Nature strengthens our sovereignty, it supports our economy, it sustains our lives and livelihoods.”

But Hunter says there’s already a “proven made-in-Alberta model” where low-impact economic activities like cattle grazing are permitted on some protected land. He added that such “working landscapes” account for some four per cent of the province’s protected lands.

Hunter said that, under the province’s definition, nearly 60 per cent of provincial lands are already protected.

He added that Canada’s Constitution gives the provinces clear jurisdiction over the management of public lands.

“Alberta supports protecting nature and biodiversity, but Canada’s Nature Strategy must reflect the constitutional reality of land management, and the work provinces are already doing,” said Hunter.

Hunter’s office told National Post that Alberta was not consulted by the federal government prior to its release of A Force of Nature: Canada’s Strategy to Protect Nature last week.

“We are reviewing the federal government’s strategy and will continue to use every tool at our disposal to ensure Alberta’s jurisdiction over land and resource management is recognized and maintained,” wrote spokesperson Ryan Fournier in an email.

Carney’s nature strategy, seen as a way for the prime minister to guard his left flank following the selection of eco-socialist Avi Lewis as the NDP’s new leader, includes commitments to a number of conservation projects. One is the Seal River Watershed National Park Reserve in northern Manitoba. The watershed is located less than 50 kilometres from the Port of Churchill, which has been floated as a possible destination  for a future heavy oil pipeline.

The strategy also earmarks $90 million to support the recovery of wood bison populations along Alberta-Northwest Territories border.

Alberta Premier Danielle Smith said in an interview last June that she wouldn’t consent to the creation of any new federal parkland in the province, citing an “overt motive” for then-parks minister and former environmental activist Steven Guilbeault to block oil and gas infrastructure.

The province previously acted in 2024 to block an agreement between Parks Canada and the city of Edmonton to create a national urban park in Edmonton’s river valley.

The Prime Minister’s Office and the office of Environment Minister Julie Dabrusin, the minister responsible for Parks Canada, didn’t immediately respond to a media inquiry about Alberta’s statement on the federal nature strategy.

National Post rmohamed@postmedia.com

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