Author Archive

“There’s a whole range of plastic items that actually we could live without, and I think we’re going to need to… We need to make sure the products we’re making are essential to society.” —Richard Thompson, marine biologist, who first coined the word “microplastics”

If you are old enough, you may remember the first time you touched a plastic bag or miraculously discovered that the shampoo bottle could bounce off the floor and not cause a mess by breaking like a glass one would. When I was a child, the reason why plastic shopping bags caught my interest was that their texture was so different from the familiar paper ones. 

Little did I realize that plastic would take over food packaging, and then take over the ocean, rivers and our bodies, including our brains. Plastics are indestructible, and our babies are being born pre-polluted. Microplastic bioaccumulation in the human placenta has been linked to premature births.

“Plastic is an essential piece of the unravelling of our human existence,” says professor of paediatrics Leo Trasande in The Plastic Crisis: A Health and Environmental Emergency, a podcast conversation with three highly knowledgeable people who know what plastics are doing to our world. https://tinyurl.com/plastics-conversation

An alarming statement, and the unravelling includes climate/biodiversity careening towards chaos because of the chemicals and fossil fuels that go into plastics. Consider that fewer than 20% of these chemicals have been investigated to understand their health implications. 

During The Big Plastic Count (https://thebigplasticcount.com), an estimated 1.7 billion pieces of plastic were thrown away in the UK in one week in March 2024. The most widely discarded were soft plastic from snacks and from fresh fruit and vegetables. Canada’s not doing any better.

Want to give up single-use plastics in your life for a month? An interesting and frustrating story emerges. Here is what happened to one journalist who tried it: https://tinyurl.com/cut-out-plastics

In many cases there appears to be currently no easy alternative. A partial solution is for governments to tax plastics and put into legislation the tools to steer an addicted public away from buying plastic-shrouded goods. 

Almost two decades ago a small island in the Caribbean was forced to give up glass bottles for plastic ones if they were to continue to drink a favourite beverage. People on the island were upset and tried get the government to refuse to accept the plastic bottles; the glass ones, which could be returned and a deposit refunded, could be used countless times—and most importantly they didn’t contribute to waste, which as you can imagine is a problem on an island. These local citizens didn’t succeed, in part because the government did not encourage public discussion. It was determined that it was a financially unacceptable burden on the beverage industry to clean and refill the glass bottles. Profit is everything, and who cares where the plastic bottles end up? 

Most plastic is made from oil, and the oil industry has little incentive to clean up after itself. To placate the public’s sense of outrage, a virtually symbolic paltry fine is imposed by governments hell bent on not disturbing the oil companies’ lobbying machinery, which ultimately funds political campaigns. 

Plastic waste ranging from toothpaste tubes to deodorant containers is exported to Java, Indonesia, to name just one country, where bakeries and street vendors burn this waste in their outdoor kitchens. The consequent contaminated food is killing thousands. In Kenya, rivers are clogged with western plastics. Since so much of the chemical/fossil fuel production and the disposal and breakdown of plastics is centred in the poorest communities, it is vital that we look at the social justice crises that arise. Some call this “garbage imperialism.”

A lawsuit pending against Danone Waters of America posits that Danone’s water in plastic bottles is not, as the company claims, natural and sustainable. Microplastics and the chemical bisphenol-A (BPA) can be found in the water. Despite what Danone will tell the court, this plastic packaging is a major factor in never creating a “sustainable” product. 

Which is more difficult to accomplish: getting individuals to give up plastic items, or having a global treaty to regulate the vast petrochemical networks that infest our world, and create legally binding targets to reduce plastics manufacturing and cut usage? We are past simply demanding behavioural change. A global plastics treaty has been in the works since 2022. It is still not in place, and if petrostates have their way, any such legislation will be wafer-thin on substance.

When California, the fifth largest economy in the world, declares certain chemicals in plastics unacceptable, petrochemical corporations will comply in California but still sell plastics that small island nations have no clout to stop. I have witnessed fossil-fuel-derived pesticides banned in Canada being sold to the global south. Scientists are telling us that there is the strong possibility that ultimately we will contaminate all our water and food, creating global conflict to procure safe food—the ultimate catastrophe. 

Last year, Carbon Brief produced an important analysis setting out the impacts of plastics on climate change. A plastics emergency is happening now, and the figures show us what is at stake and why the world must curb the production of plastics.  https://tinyurl.com/plastics-charts

In 2022 more than 170 nations backed a UN resolution to end plastic pollution. Inger Andersen, Executive Director of the UN environmental programme, declared: “Today marks a triumph by planet Earth over single-use plastics. This is the most significant environmental multilateral deal since the Paris accord. It is an insurance policy for this generation and future ones.” Sadly, she spoke too soon. No treaty of any substance came out of the summit.

The fifth conference of the UN Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee took place in Busan, South Korea in November 2024. “The failure of the Busan negotiations marks a significant setback in global efforts to combat plastic pollution,” concluded sustainability expert Mitota P. Omolere. “However, it also serves as a reminder of the complexities involved in international diplomacy where economic interests often clash with environmental imperatives.” https://tinyurl.com/busan-conference

The plastics treaty was derailed by petrochemical states such as Saudi Arabia. The previous conference, which took place in Ottawa in April 2024, had also been imperilled by an invasion of lobbyists and national governments vigorously protecting fossil-fuel interests. https://tinyurl.com/lobbying-plastics

Political momentum has definitely started to move beyond the all-encompassing reach of petrostates. The plastics treaty can be a catalyst for change, but action needs to be taken now. 

Plastics recycling is not the answer. The chemicals in plastics simply get dispersed along with microplastics, and failing to address the issue of production perpetuates dependency and provides a perceived rationale to continue using plastics. Reducing the amount of plastics manufactured, as mentioned in the plastic treaty negotiations, can have a great benefit for all life on Earth. Wildlife is impacted terribly and tragically by the release of these plastics into Nature. May 17 was Endangered Species Day, and plastics play an enormous part in pulling apart the ecological fabric of Earth. 

Nor is token banning of, for example, plastic shopping bags, as in Québec, going to solve the problem. However, there are small steps we can all take to reduce our dependence on single-use plastics. When the local bakery asks you if you want a plastic bag for your bread for the freezer, hand them a reusable plastic bag or request a paper one. Buying take-away food? Bring your own containers. Styrofoam will last for a million years. We must immediately stop indulging in short-term, unnecessary conveniences. 

“Oh human misery, how many things you must serve for money.” —Leonardo da Vinci 

It is an incredible sketch that Leonardo da Vinci drew between 1506 and 1512: bottles, rakes, lanterns, bagpipes, shears as well as other discarded goods have rained down on the Earth. He called it A cloudburst of material possessions. https://tinyurl.com/vinci-consumption

Perhaps it is the first artistic rendering of wasteful consumption. Of course, overconsumption has vastly accelerated since the 16th century, and now oil-derived plastics are found in our bodies and in the ocean. Plastics in the ocean will soon outweigh all the fish. 

The first thing that can be accomplished to put an end to this carnage is to find and prosecute the largest petrochemical companies responsible for the enormous destruction they have negligently inflicted upon the world. Later this month an entire article will be dedicated to the bane of plastics, but for now let’s meet some of the people and organizations that are making a difference around the world, often in small towns or in the countryside. Many individuals have been hugely successful in tenaciously confronting local corruption in corporations and governments large and small. Issues pertaining to wildlife, climate breakdown and energy, mining pollution and disenfranchisement of local populations, ocean and freshwater zones as well as environmental justice have long been focal points for campaigns.

Of course people like naturalist David Attenborough https://tinyurl.com/naturalist-attenborough Ecologist and Indigenous rights campaigner from India, S. Faizi https://tinyurl.com/ecologist-Faiziand Canada’s David Suzuki have long inspired actions that go on to galvanize whole communities to successfully demand legislation or litigation to protect ecologically pristine areas and support communities’ pollution-free rights against rampant greed. 

A classic example of how the public finds the courage to act was epitomized in the film Erin Brockovich. The film portrays a woman who stops a gas and electric company from continuing to flout regulations that were meant to stop groundwater contamination in Hinkley, California 30-plus years ago. 

The Goldman Environmental Prize was established in 1989 by Richard and Rhoda Goldman, who felt the strong need to give a public voice to and thus multiply the viability for “ordinary” people to take action to confront groups that desecrate Nature.

“The Prize recognizes individuals for sustained and significant efforts to protect and enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk. The Goldman Prize views ‘grassroots’ leaders as those involved in local efforts, where positive change is created through community or citizen participation. Through recognizing these individual leaders, the Prize seeks to inspire other ordinary people to take extraordinary actions to protect the natural world.” https://www.goldmanprize.org/

The 2025 prizes were awarded this Earth Week to winners from six corners of the planet. These remarkable people through years of painstaking work defied the largest companies in order to achieve justice. Laurene Allen from New Hampshire spearheaded the closure of the Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics plant that had caused “20 years of rampant air, soil, and water pollution.” Besjana Guri and Olsi Nika of Albania received the prize for stopping the building of a hydroelectric dam on one of Europe’s last wild rivers. Vjosa Wild River National Park is the result of their community effort. Since 1989 226 environmental defenders from 95 different countries have been honoured with the Goldman Prize. It’s inspiring to read about the ongoing endeavours of these people. Read about these valiant campaigners at https://tinyurl.com/goldman-winners

In addition to these prizewinners, a thousand or more champions throughout the world are striving to restore their community lands and waters in 2025. Melinda Janki is an international lawyer who is opposed to dangerous deep-sea oil and gas exploitation offshore Guyana. She says: “Stopping these projects is non-negotiable for the ocean, the atmosphere, and life on Earth—the stakes couldn’t be higher.” https://www.melindajanki.org

 Xiye Bastida is a 22-year-old climate justice activist and storyteller. She is Executive Director of Re-Earth Initiative, a global youth-led organization that aims to make the climate movement more accessible. She is of Otomi-Toltec heritage, and she “integrates Indigenous worldviews of reciprocity, interdependence, and intergenerational responsibility into global climate advocacy.” Her activism began after her hometown of San Pedro Tultepec, Mexico experienced flooding and water contamination, thus learning firsthand about climate upheaval. https://www.xiyebeara.com/about

These Earth defenders are subject to violence from governments, corporations and gangs. This is why groups like the Goldman Prize are dedicated to giving vital security support to many fearless individuals. 

It is no secret that many governments are passing laws that make it dangerous, if not impossible, to investigate crimes against Nature. Many times, corrupt corporations will actually write the laws and give them to government legislators! These corporations and their lobbyists have greater legal expertise than legislative bodies. https://tinyurl.com/corporate-legislation

In Canada lobbyists have undue influence on public officials. https://tinyurl.com/canadian-lobbying

People are being imprisoned or even murdered for protecting Earth and their right to prosper. So-called democracies such as India are being whittled away by the repression of journalists. Indigenous people know this all too well.

There is so much more we could be doing to organize in our communities and demand more from local, provincial and federal elected authorities. We need to follow the lead of the courageous advocates for justice and protect our rights and those of the Earth.

“Somewhere between action and reaction there is an interaction, and that’s where all the magic and fun lie.” —Tyson Yunkaporta, Indigenous Elder, author and scholar

When studies are made of human impact on almost 100,000 ecological sites across the globe and all give similar results showing that humans directly and deleteriously affect the viability of those sites, we know that human populations are completely out of balance with other forms of life—and ultimately with their own interests. This is the sobering conclusion of an article in Naturemagazine titled “The Global Human Impact on Biodiversity,” which compiled 2,133 publications covering 3,667 independent comparisons of biodiversity impacts. https://tinyurl.com/activity-and-biodiversity

Monarch butterflies are frequently spoken of as being a source of wonderment. These extraordinary insects migrate 4,800 kilometres from the sacred fir trees of central Mexico up to eastern Canada and northeast USA, and then back again. They achieve this journey by propagating a few generations of butterflies along the way. It is an amazing story.

Yet the fate of these charismatic creatures is a well-documented example of humans’ overreach into Nature, witnessed in the catastrophic effects of human activity on the endangered habitats along the insects’ migration routes and in their final destinations. 

As we know, monarch butterflies are in trouble in eastern North America, but they are even more so in the west. But we can help to reverse their tragic decline. We can do so much more to support them when they arrive by making sure the right milkweed plants are available for the caterpillars to eat. 

This month Oliver Milman wrote in The Guardian: “Last year, the US government proposed the species be listed as endangered for the first time, its numbers winnowed away by habitat loss, pesticide use and the onward relentless march of the climate crisis.” https://tinyurl.com/butterfly-migration

Publications like The Guardian are committed to making it transparent that the world’s ecological integrity is being put in danger by humans’ propensity to tear down an astonishingly crafted evolutionary system. The newspaper has dedicated much work to educating western readers and alert them to the huge crises the planet is facing now, but a large, long-term sustained effort is also being made to engage people in acting because they love Nature. By creating a pathway for wonder and contemplation of Nature much has been achieved.

The Guardian even has a contest for invertebrate of the year and encourages people to vote for their favourite. “We backboned beasts are a tiny minority, barely 5% of the planet’s species,” writes Patrick Barkham. “Most life on Earth has chosen a spineless path, and they are animals of amazing diversity: beetles, bivalves, bees; corals, crabs, cephalopods; snails, spiders and sponges… Many of these animals perform vital functions for our habitable planet. Invertebrates supply the vast majority of pollination that enables us to grow food, and enjoy flowers. Invertebrates make soil, and keep it fertile. They clean water and tidy land, devouring poo or decomposing animals, repelling everything from bad smells to deadly diseases.” For more on this and a range of other engaging articles about insects and other invertebrates, see https://www.theguardian.com/environment/invertebrates

Whether we notice the critically important earthworm when we are gardening, or pass by a flowering apple tree in May and hear bees pollinating, any celebration on the 55th anniversary of Earth Day on April 22 puts Nature at the forefront. This seems obvious. EARTHDAY.ORG tries to engage us in its corporate way by reaching out through its 2025 theme Our Power, Our Planet. The plea is to vigorously embrace alternatives to fossil fuel energy so that we can reverse the climate crisis that threatens Earth’s biodiversity. The website asks individuals along with local and national governments to conscientiously strive to accelerate commitments for renewable energy. www.earthday.org

This sounds valid enough, but Earth Day is a once-a-year popup event that we are told a billion people participate in. It is also a non-profit trade mark organization that makes a lot of money. The website has a greenish activist tone to it: “The organization continues to build a historic movement as citizens of the world rise up in a united call for the creativity, innovation, ambition, and bravery that we need to meet our climate crisis and seize the enormous opportunities of a zero-carbon future.”

Earth Day Canada (www.earthday.ca), the Canadian version of earthday.org, talks up the same word salad and announces each year that Earth Day should be celebrated every day. Fair enough, but have these platitudes translated into meaningful actions? The website speaks about the need to protect biodiversity and stalwartly declares we are also a part of biodiversity. “Our interactions with the world around us need to be thought anew to lower our impact. Focusing on the preservation and restoration of biodiversity will do just that. And because ecosystems differ from one region to another, local actions need to be implemented. Municipalities operate on a local scale and as such, they are the first to see the changes in the ecosystems around them. It also means that they are the best positioned to implement impactful actions to preserve or restore biodiversity.” This strikes a true sensibility for our problems.

Bishop’s University’s guide to positive biodiversity involvement has some bright stories. The First Supper: A Food Conversation & Art Experience, a symposium held a month ago, gave us a taste of what will be continued in September. It enabled the university community and beyond to “bring together experts and practitioners in agriculture, sustainability, and food systems to explore hopeful initiatives that are reshaping the way we produce and engage with food.”

Unfortunately, contrary to this vision, the university’s rigid status quo system is more concerned with laying out expensive grass sod instead of planting perennials, and spending thousands of student dollars for one evening of high-carbon-emissions “skiing” that left two increasingly filthy mounds of blackened snow in the quadrangle for months. Equally, using highly noise- and air-polluting gasoline leaf blowers—electric ones need to be recharged too frequently, I was told—does not add credibility to the overall uncreative bureaucratic reach of that institution. 

Journalists who cover the climate/biodiversity crises have now banded together across the globe to share scientifically based climate news and expand local coverage around the world. The organization Covering Climate Cooperative (www.coveringclimate.org), launched on Earth Day 2021, has also launched the 89 Percent Project: “The overwhelming majority of the world’s people—between 80 and 89%, according to recent science—want governments to take stronger action. But that fact is not reflected in our news coverage, which helps explain why the 89% don’t know that they are the global majority.” https://89percent.org

April 21 marks the beginning of a year-long worldwide effort through Covering Climate Now to promote and report on what the 89% of the world’s population want to be done to address the urgent need to act on the climate crisis. 

When hubris gives way to humbleness and wonder, our interactions with Nature will benefit us all. 

“I don’t think you can have a really satisfactory life today without joining in the fight to save our planet…. We’re past the moment where inaction is acceptable.” 
—Kristine Tompkins

You may not know who Kristine Tompkins is, but her Patagonia outdoor clothing company’s products can be found around the world. She is also one of the world’s foremost conservationists. The millions of acres of pristine lands that she and her now late husband Doug bought in southern Chile and Argentina have been the basis for national parks there. With the indispensable aid of many local groups and the added expertise of other conservationists, a widely successful campaign to bring back the jaguar and other megafauna continues to accelerate.

Recently Tompkins spoke with Nate Hagens, the driving force behind The Great Simplification broadcasts, which, through conversations with inspiring individuals, endeavour to make sense of the climate and biodiversity crises and the possible solutions available to our world. In an interview titled “Rewilding 15 Million Acres: Why True Wealth Means More Than Money,” listeners learned that Tompkins’ approach to helping solve the world’s problems is to go at them relentlessly with all the power she can muster—and not look back. She speaks forcefully about how otherwise educated and well-off people abdicate their ethical responsibilities for a blinded consciousness. We usually think of the word ‘abdicate’ as in giving up, voluntarily or not, one’s kingdom or position as head of government, but Tompkins is clearly making this personal. Sure, increasingly governments, educational institutions and corporate executives have brazenly relinquished their social and Nature leadership roles, but so have most individuals, and particularly so in the rich west. This powerfully wrought interview points directly at us. https://tinyurl.com/tompkins-true-wealth

So let’s talk cruise ships and the decision to take them as an abdication of our responsibility to be informed citizens. Most people have bought into the fake narrative given by the largest cruise companies that those ocean or river voyages are, or are on the way to being, a non-polluting way to have a vacation. Bluntly put, this is pure rubbish: food waste, specifically. Some liners are burning it for energy, while others are considering serving up smaller meals, but it seems that many privileged holidaymakers think that huge portions of food go with a cultural experience, and that abundance of food is an entitlement. We all know that food waste is at epidemic levels in our society, but cruise ships are famous for it.

The sulphur oxide and nitrogen oxide emissions from the heavy oil used in cruise ships have a massive impact on human health, but although there has been a push by cities affected by this pollution to electrify cruise ships while at port in order to allay local outrage, a minuscule number of ships have taken advantage of this objective. 

Although the cruise industry is embracing ‘natural’ gas energy to power its ships away from very dirty oil, methane gas (euphemistically called natural gas) contains its own turbocharged climate baggage, so it is not a viable solution.

Cruise ships are now being banned or told to leave areas where there are large concentrations of people. The air in Venice improved by 80% after monster ships were no longer permitted to dock there. Amsterdam is taking another approach. Hester van Buren, the city’s deputy mayor, stated: “Sea cruising is a polluting form of tourism and contributes to crowds and emissions in the city. By limiting sea cruises, requiring [them to use] shore power and aiming for the cruise terminal to move from its current location in 2035, the council is responsibly implementing the council’s proposal to stop sea cruises.” https://tinyurl.com/amsterdam-cruise-ships

Barcelona’s citizens are also resisting the menace, and the proposal for a cruise port near Rome has equally experienced local opposition. Overtourism is the reason Nice, France will stop cruise ships docking, and in Belfast, Maine any ship with more then 50 passengers will be prohibited.

Remember that air pollution is only one of many different kinds of pollution. It is still not uncommon to discover all sorts of trash and oil slicks jettisoned from these floating cities. Many times it is the poorest people’s communities that are chosen for and plagued by the development of infrastructure for cruise ships. 

For two decades there has been a campaign by the cruise industry to encourage professional medical organizations, as well as others, to hold conferences on its ships. These conferences are often billed as “continuing education” cruises, so they are written off as professional events. https://tinyurl.com/cruise-education

On top of this, many delegates will be travelling by plane to get to the ship, so these presumed educated elites are drastically intensifying their carbon impact.

Obviously it is not only medical conferences that fill these ships, but our neighbours take them too, and perhaps you do as well. We are, furthermore, given the green light to take these “voyages of a lifetime” when we learn that the World Wildlife Fund gives advice on how cruise companies can lessen their impact on wildlife. Millions of dollars are given for such advice. “Training or awareness materials for cruise line staff on wildlife products and laws can help prevent problems onboard. Cruise lines and tour operators can invest in awareness programs that are positive and empower passengers to make informed decisions.” In other words, on your trip around the Galápagos don’t put a tortoise in your pocket. https://www.worldwildlife.org/pages/our-solution

The hype of exploration-type cruises feeds rich westerners the WWF-type collaboration and “we care about the wellbeing of the planet” mantra. As an example, after flying to southern Chile from North America and Europe, rich customers board polar ships to wander around and see icebergs and penguins off the coast of Antarctica. In some cases National Geographic wildlife photographers are embedded in these $75,000-a-pop extravaganzas. This makes these luxurious guzzling trips look official and even promotes a serious educational goal. People readily buy into this misinformation because they wish to abdicate any ethical concerns for the prestige these opulent excursions afford. 

If we all committed to making informed decisions, no one would ever take a cruise ship. The legacy of such holidays is obvious: more intensified climate and biodiversity chaos affecting your children, grandchildren and probably you. Abdicating responsibility is what the global north excels at. Colonialism continues in many forms; billionaires are the latest manifestation of a take-all society best expressed in 2025 with the rise of oligarchs’ take-over of governments. 

But still people flock to the deals for cruise vacations that can be as low as $600 for six nights. These next few months will have all sorts of bonanza for the undereducated and “couldn’t care less” cruiser. The butcher, the school teacher, the yoga instructor and the philosophy professor are equally culpable in answering the cruise call. 

Naturally, cruise ships die, and when they are about to, they land in Pakistan, India, Bangladesh or Turkey to be dismantled at a heart-rending price for local communities and ocean ecology. In Pakistan, workers earn US$4 a day for shifts as long as 16 hours. Accidents are frequent and corruption is rampant, making it difficult or impossible for relatives to receive compensation. See: https://tinyurl.com/cruise-ships-die

Global south citizens don’t take cruise ships, but a portion of 10% of the world’s population found in the global north often do. Ecocide and social justice issues have long been a part of industrial society. This entitled folly must end if there is to be anything left to sustain all forms of life.

Let us return to the words of Kristine Tompkins: “To abdicate your own heart, lungs, mind… That is the most crushing, fatal lack of a decision you will ever make. You are abdicating your own future, hands down.”

“What’s important is that children have an opportunity to bond with the natural world, to learn to love it, before being asked to heal its wounds.”
—David Sobel, Beyond Ecophobia

Nurturing young people to internalize a deep sense of wonder and connection with Nature is paramount if future generations are to thrive. Jessica Adams takes up this joyful quest with great enthusiasm. I asked her about her educational work and her commitment to make a difference for many Nature-deprived children.

Jessica, can you tell our readers how your childhood influenced your present work?

I was fortunate to grow up with family members who shared their curiosity and appreciation for the natural world. My parents kept close watch on the visitors to our bird feeder, monitored and recorded when migrant species returned, and would marvel at the chorus of frogs that erupted each spring and the curious winnowing of the Wilson’s Snipe as it performed its aerial display over the field in front of our house. Appreciating Nature for its beauty and brilliance was a part of life.

I also had an incredible natural setting to my childhood. We moved to the Eastern Townships from Brossard when I was five. I had almost 20 acres of forest to explore behind the house, and neighbours who didn’t mind if I wandered onto their property to investigate different ecosystems or scout out some good climbing trees.

When my parents shared about Nature, I wasn’t always listening with rapt attention and I wasn’t always keen to head outside when my parents told me to. Sometimes I just wanted to do the easy thing—watch TV, for example. But most of the time they’d insist, so out I’d go (little brother usually in tow). Sometimes we would complain that there was “nothing to do” or that we were bored, but eventually we’d find something to do and get completely engrossed in it. As an adult, I’m incredibly grateful for these moments. Learning how to be in and curious about Nature happens very organically when given the opportunity. 

All of this meant that, when I was presented with the option to pursue university studies in either veterinary medicine or wildlife biology, the choice was obvious.

You write about Nature Nerding. What does it mean to be a Nature Nerd?

Completing my bachelor’s in Wildlife Biology brought me to the next level of nerdiness. I’d learnt so much and also gained a humbling appreciation for how much there was that I didn’t (and might never) know. I found this incredibly exciting. It meant that the opportunities for discovery were endless, and it also got me thinking that the wonder, awe and joy I experienced when learning about Nature were something I just had to share.

Working with Parc d’environnement naturel de Sutton enabled me to hone my identification and animation skills, but most importantly I found my voice as an educator and communicator. In developing and leading programs for various audiences, I found that I favoured an enquiry-based approach that involved using as many of the senses as possible as well as discussion with those who accompanied me. I realized that listing the names of the species I had learnt about in university wasn’t the most valuable thing I could impart to others. Most impactful of all was sharing my passion, piquing people’s curiosity, and teaching how to look and learn.

I view Nature Nerding as a lens that allows us to see the natural world from a different perspective, founded in insatiable curiosity and fervent enthusiasm for all life forms. I always say that going for a walk is never “just a walk.” It’s a process of expanding your awareness and opening yourself to the joy and wonder of noticing the world around you.

This noticing isn’t purely for the sake of interest, but is a way of cultivating a sense of connection and belonging. As we take more notice, suddenly Nature is no longer separate from us and it’s no longer an inanimate backdrop to our human existence, but rather a thriving, animated context where our life and the lives of so many other beings are taking place simultaneously and are inextricably linked.

Tell us about your current work at the Massawippi Foundation.

I had the pleasure of meeting the Massawippi Foundation as they were looking to develop their educational mandate. We piloted our first edition of the education program in 2022 with two classes from local schools. We now have nine schools (four English, five French) and 18 classes from grades 3 and 4 participating. Several teachers have been with us since the inaugural year and I am now the Education Program Coordinator.

The program is built on the premise “We protect what we love. We love what we know.” Over 300 students come to Scowen Park through the program, each class visiting for a two-hour outing each season. Outing themes reflect the seasons, providing learning opportunities that allow students to situate themselves in the unique multi-seasonal context of our region. The aim is to cultivate curiosity and wonder, encouraging careful observation using all the senses, and fostering mindfulness in our interactions with the natural world.

Having established meaningful relationships with many of the schools in the Massawippi watershed, we wish to continue cultivating those ties and our hope is to have a program for each level up to grade 6.

Can you tell us how these gatherings foster a newfound awareness of the children’s role as ambassadors for bringing about a closeness with Nature? 

The majority of the work I’ve been involved in has been with primary school children. These children go home after an outing or activity with us and share about their experiences.

It’s important that we recognize the impact and influence young children can have on their parents as they convey their excitement and wonder after spending time outdoors learning with their peers.

You have chosen not to encumber the young people who come on your programs with details of climate breakdown or biodiversity loss. What do you hope students will come away with through this positive approach?

When you study and work in any environment-related field it is impossible not to become painfully aware of the dire predicament we are in. I was lucky because my exposure to and understanding of this came at a time when I was old enough to digest such complex and alarming information. Even so, I have moments where I feel completely defeated…

I’ve found that in order to gain an appreciation for the magnitude and complexity of this environmental ordeal, it’s imperative that we zoom out and view the puzzle as a whole composed of many interconnected parts. I’ve also found that if I’m to do something with that overwhelming information, I have to zoom right back in and focus on one small piece. My chosen piece is education. More precisely, Nature education and connection. Most importantly, instilling a deep love and appreciation for the natural world of which we are very much a part.

I’m not saying that’s enough on its own. But I firmly believe it’s the key place to start as we go about cultivating a relationship with Nature. It takes something that can be overwhelming and boils it down to something so simple, so fundamental: love and belonging. I can’t think of a more solid foundation on which to construct our understanding of the world around us.

Do you believe that by being close with Nature, children will naturally become guardians of Nature?

It’s by no means a given that young people who have these formative experiences learning in and about Nature will go on to dedicate their lives to conservation. But I like to think that the seeds sown can influence values formed and choices made in many different ways.

If I were to envision a future where we succeed in repairing our fractured relationship with the natural world, I’d think of conservation not as a field in and of itself, but rather as a universal mindset. Regardless of whether every child impacted by a Nature-education experience becomes an advocate for conservation, perhaps these experiences will be part of creating an important shift in adopting respect and awareness for the environment as a universal shared value.

Naive? Perhaps. But at the very least, they’ve been exposed to the healthiest and most fundamental/sustaining relationship—that with Nature.

Tell us what adventures you have planned for this summer. I hear there’s something to do with mud!

I’ll be running WonderMud in collaboration with Meagan Patch. For the second summer in a row, we’re inviting children aged 5—12 to spend time outdoors moving, exploring and connecting with the land. We want to combine our love for Nature, agriculture and education in a way that strips away overplanning and overanimating and brings young people back to the basics. https://tinyurl.com/wondermud

https://www.facebook.com/nature.nerding
https://massawippi.org/

“This is really why I made my daughters learn to garden—so they would always have a mother to love them, long after I am gone.” 
―Robin Wall Kimmerer

It might still be winter, but the seed catalogue has arrived, just as it has for the last 50 years, and the tradition to hunker down in a comfortable chair to see what’s being offered that I haven’t tried growing before is an exploration and a celebration. I’ve already sown some vegetable seeds in containers in my indoor mini-greenhouses to transfer at the appropriate times to the garden. Of course, the garlic and the tulips were planted in early November, and when the green tips push through the leaf mulch I’ll know that spring has arrived. Soon after I’ll test how some early spinach does before committing to a larger patch in the garden. When my hand feels some warmth resting on the soil, many cold-weather vegetables will be ready to be seeded or transplanted into the garden.

Last year’s garden did remarkably well: pea vines grew five feet tall in a fifty-foot row and a second sowing in late August yielded an autumn harvest. We were eating kale through to the end of December. The harvest of fifteen other vegetables was plentiful, and the yield of two bushels of squash enabled me to share them with others. The rains came at the right time,and summer’s heat was sufficient to get aubergine, enough hot peppers to make a year’s worth of hot sauce, and four generations of basil and beans. The tomatoes were happy too. The beautiful broad dark green squash leaves, some bursting out of the compost, were a joy to see.

Can we expect this year’s local gardens to measure up to last year’s? Perhaps the heat experienced in the summer of 2024 was a mirage. Around the world, many places experienced the tragedy of floods or severe drought. Are we playing a game of dumb luck now when we store seeds for the next year and expect a positive outcome? 

Stable weather has become a roll of the dice. More than likely scientists aren’t speaking about weather in 2025 but about climate breakdown. And yet, and yet, corrupted politicians and grotesquely indulged westerners keep up the pretence that a cruise or a flight doesn’t contribute to more CO2 in the air, and in any case everyone is doing the same thing. This is an example of green criminality. 

In 2023 the garden produced hardly anytomatoes, and only the lettuce varieties did really well. It rained too much and too hard, making for a cold summer. The problem was the reverse in other parts of the world. Parched soil and sudden floods caused havoc, leading to the poorest people wondering if they were to survive. 

In Canada and elsewhere, market gardeners wouldn’t dream of not having large greenhouses, which are their insurance against unpredictable weather, and many backyard gardens have them as well. 

When all those joyous seeds arrive in a box by post, or when you first see those racks of seeds at the local hardware store proclaiming the cycle of life, a newfound doubt lingers upon opening those seed packets. This year is already on course to become a scorcher—think Los Angeles. And with good reason: the last 25 years of accelerating climate upheaval have brought a litany of uncertainties to plague farmers and home gardeners alike.

But growing an organic garden is more than starry-eyed hope for stable weather and luck in 2025. It’s an action that confirms our commitment to the planet’s fecundity, its beauty and biodiversity, as well as to ourselves. It is a sweet statement of trust and gratitude that rebels against the thoughtless consumerism that blankets many of the decisions that have led to the climate crisis. It can be also a visceral protest against the industrial farming that tries to pass as nurturing food.

The decision to garden, Margaret Atwood says, “is not a rational act.” Planning a garden, envisioning its success and finally realizing a cornucopia of healthy plants is an act of agency accomplished by dedicated work. Picking up a hoe or a spade becomes an act of defiance.

If this is the year when you consider digging up that lawn to plant a flower garden to encourage pollinators to visit, or dream of going out in the morning to pick a cucumber or bite into a tomato, you couldn’t have chosen a better time to stand up for besieged Nature, for we are on the cusp of losing it all. After all, for decades the science has detailed how lawns are basically dead zones, so why not vote for life?   https://tinyurl.com/lawns-climate-change  Even after one season, life comes back to a garden’s soil.  When you add even a small pool of water, insects and birds flourish that much more easily.

Here are some seed catalogues to choose from: https://www.thegardenwebsite.com/plant-seed-catalogues.html

Bonne chance!

“’Tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus. Our bodies are our gardens to the which our wills are gardeners.” 
—William Shakespeare, Othello 

“A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books.”
—Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

“Consider your origin: you were not made to live like brutes, but to follow virtue and knowledge.”

—Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Inferno (ca 1321)

“Our food system is undermining our ability to feed humanity now and into the future… It is no exaggeration to say that what happens in the next five years will determine the future of life on Earth.”

—WWF, Living Planet Report 2024: A System in Peril

“The low retail cost of industrialized food can obscure its very high environmental price tag.”

—United Nations Environment Programme

 “We depend on land for our survival. Yet we treat it like dirt.”

—UN Secretary-General António Guterres

The UN biodiversity summit, the UN climate summit, the UN desertification summit and the Global Plastics Treaty negotiations this autumn all ended in disappointing and far fewer positive negotiations than life on Earth can tolerate. 

But are individuals doing any better than governments to protect Nature? The over-50s have failed to live up to their potential to facilitate meaningful positive change for life on Earth. Younger generations, if they are to survive, urgently need to forge on past those global north entitled generations and get on with making Earth an equitable place. 

The following scenario is a microcosm of how we are failing as older adults: a festive group of enthusiasts go out into the “great outdoors” around Christmas with the aim of socializing and communing with wildlife—observing and recording the migratory birds passing over, and others that overwinter in the area. A good feeling of solidarity permeates the tribe, proud that they can be thought of as participating citizen scientists. In this time of increasing ecological uncertainty this group of acquaintances will probably be passing on their data from this outing to help scientists who study birds. Good work from dedicated conservationists! 

A celebration is called for. How about a delicious organic vegan meal that honours the group and the rest of Nature, and recognizes the connection and continuum of all life on the planet? 

But no, the opposite happens. Favouring cheap food packaged to be easy to hand out, the group choose instead the flesh of tortured birds who have spent their short lives crammed into the factory farms that contaminate the rivers, air and soil with their effluent and accelerate wildlife extinction. (Besides the harm they perpetrate on the planet, these establishments pay terrible wages. No rural community wants them nearby because of the odours and air pollution and the negative effect on house prices.)

It would be fair to ask whether these Christmas revellers are oblivious to the impact their choice has on wildlife, human health and even Indigenous justice issues related to deforestation and climate when buying this celebratory supper. But, as in so many instances, this is far from being the case. Despite knowing full well about the misery and devastation caused by the demand for factory farms, they go ahead and decide to eat antibiotic-laden birds—and even declare that after the meal they will be “doing their bit” by taking the toxic bones to compost!

Some of them might try to justify their choice by pointing out that there are codes of practice in the agri-food industry that afford protection to chickens. But adhering to the Codes of Practice proposed by the National Farm Animal Care Council is voluntary and is not enforced by the Québec government. Unbelievably, the industry is policing itself. And animal welfare is not a priority. Profits are. People hoping to assuage their guilt for contributing to the suffering at these factory farms by mentioning these mercurial ‘Codes of Practice’ cannot disregard their own culpability. 

Anyone who really cares protecting birds would not wish to indulge in a meal consisting of factory-farmed chickens. 

Does this ignorance come down to a great psychological barrier reinforced over the last several hundred years by capitalist cultures that humans are not part of Nature, and that although we may profess some empathy for non-human species, they are there principally to be consumed?

Ecocide and Indigenous genocide go hand and hand with that global north mindset. 

In a paper titled ‘The Ordinary Acts that Contribute to Ecocide,” criminologist Robert Agnew endeavours to explain “why individuals and small groups engage in a range of ‘ordinary’ acts that contribute to the destruction of the natural environment.” Agnew explains that leading crime theories have much to say about why individuals engage in ordinary harms that contribute to ecocide, even though these harms represent conformist behaviour, and concludes by reminding readers why the application of leading crime theories to ordinary harms is important. The discussion on “crimes of denial” is spoken of but also how capitalism sets the stage to give free rein to these ordinary and local crimes. In our above story, what influences this conformist group is the dirt-cheap price for the unethical meal as well as a notion of individual entitlement inculcated by capitalism and exceptionalism. See https://tinyurl.com/green-criminality

Chicken factory farms are always problematic for communities to accept because they impinge on the right of citizens to clean air and water. What looks like a regionally raised chicken is often being made possible by the existence of a vast network of cheap industrially grown feedstock located in deforested tropical areas, which in turn has direct consequences for Indigenous people’s ability to live in those places. “Local” becomes just a dimension of international ecocide. Indigenous environmental victimization is suddenly played out over a well-meaning group’s contaminating chicken meal.

The Center for Biological Diversity has this to say in a fact sheet about the environmental costs of eating poultry:“Factory farms often have multiple industrial-scale sheds, each as large as 36,000 square feet, containing hundreds of thousands of birds in total. Manure application and feed production further expand the footprint of chicken production. Throughout the ‘Broiler Belt’ region, chicken production has destroyed natural habitat for native wildlife.” https://tinyurl.com/chicken-facts

In 2018, 71% of all bird biomass globally consisted of poultry, while wild birds made up just 21%. That gap is increasing. https://tinyurl.com/bird-biomass

WWF’s 2024 Living Planet Report details an average 73% decline in wildlife populations since 1970. The report warns that, as the Earth approaches dangerous tipping points posing grave threats to humanity, a huge collective effort will be required to tackle the dual climate and Nature crises.

Our mindset can change. If some of those people who decided on a supper menu were young and had read the Living Planet Report 2024 Youth Edition, there is no way they would have chosen to eat factory-farmed birds. https://tinyurl.com/report-youth-edition

Adults can revise their opinions by making an effort to gain scientific knowledge about wildlife and extinction through reading the Living Planet Report for adults. https://tinyurl.com/planet-adult-edition

The Center for Biological Diversity offers some tips for a wildlife-friendly diet: “Every meal is an opportunity to help protect wildlife by taking extinction off your plate. Replace chicken in traditional dishes by trying chicken-free veggie pot pies, fajitas, alfredo pasta, pad thai and burritos.” https://tinyurl.com/chicken-alternatives

“Anyone who develops deep knowledge of other species by living alongside them for years realizes something both obvious and essential: we are not the only lives that matter.”

—Melanie Challenger, ‘Animals in the Room’, Emergence Magazine, August 2023

“Governments have retreated from even their legally binding promises to decarbonize, trusting markets to deliver comparatively meager emissions reductions instead, and activists have been unable to generate meaningful public outrage at the walkback.”

—David Wallace-Wells, New York Times

Oil and gas are a “gift of god,” declares UN COP29 climate summit host Azerbaijan president Ilham Aliyev, as thousands attend the conference in Baku, the capital, which was built on oil revenues. It appears that Canada believes the same.

It has just been revealed by Canada’s environmental law charity Ecojustice and environmental advocacy organization Environmental Defence that the emissions from the oil, gas and coal Canada exports are increasing at such a rate that they now vastly exceed its own domestic energy emissions. This makes a mockery of Canada’s proclamation at COP28 that it is a climate leader.

More than 1,700 fossil fuel lobbyists, including those pushing for controversial carbon capture and storage technology, swarmed COP29 as the Azerbaijan government welcomed the most powerful oil and gas CEOs. Joseph Sikulu, a member of the Pacific Climate Warriors and Pacific Director for climate campaign group 350.org, exclaimed, “How can we achieve the ambition that is needed to save our homes when these negotiations are continually flooded with fossil fuel lobbyists? There is a ban on tobacco lobbyists from attending the World Health Organization’s summit. Why is that not the case for the fossil fuel industry at COP? We demand that the upcoming COP presidencies set clear rules against the presence of fossil fuel interests at the negotiating table. Our lives depend on it.” https://tinyurl.com/cop-reform

An open letter on COP climate reforms, written by climate policy experts and climate scientists to the UN Secretary General and COP Executive Secretary, asks for a move away from endless negotiations to delivery of agreed-upon negotiations. Money allocated to compensate countries of the global south and aid them so that they can adapt and create a resilient response to ongoing climate catastrophes (loss and damage) must be honoured. Key reforms urged also include locking out fossil fuel lobbyists and countries that push for more fossil fuel expansion. https://www.clubofrome.org/cop-reform/

This is music to many people’s ears, as the present COP structure, which has never produced any transition away from fossil energies, has lost the confidence of so many people. No wonder the last three climate conferences have taken place in autocratic petrostates. The letter went on to say, “It is now clear that the COP is no longer fit for purpose… We need a shift from negotiation to implementation. We need strict eligibility criteria to exclude countries who do not support the phase-out/transition away from fossil energy. Host countries must demonstrate their high level of ambition to uphold the goals of the Paris agreement.” 

Since the level of atmospheric CO2 has increased 26% in the last 10 years, it would be reasonable to question whether the 29th UN climate talks—with more than 65,000 people registered— will make any difference. The presence of 1,700 fossil-fuel lobbyists doesn’t help!

The World Meteorological Organization declared recently that 2024 had shown a 1.5-degree Celsius (1.5C) temperature rise since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution and the intensive burning of fossil fuels. Although there are those who say that this increase in global temperature is not necessarily demonstrating that a 1.5C or more rise is here to stay, it is more than disconcerting that this spike in temperature came well before its predicted date. You may recall that the declarations pasted onto the Paris UN summit agreement in 2015 proclaimed a limit of 1.5C for this century as being the maximum acceptable. But the climate pledges already given would lead to a disastrous 2.1C rise. 

This is why the Open Letter to the UN is so important: it lays out a path away from endless negotiations and demands the keeping of the promises stated so jubilantly at the 2015 summit in Paris, which ranged from honouring pledges of financial support for countries in the global south to successfully keeping atmospheric temperatures well below 2 degrees Celsius. As every part of the planet has now experienced climate emergencies, there should be an easy-to-make argument that the UN conference must be broken up into smaller working groups focused on climate justice and a swift transition away from fossil-fuel energy. 

But climate action at the COP is also endangered by far-right governments. Argentina is a case in point: under the instructions of its president, Javier Milei, it has given up participating in the COP29 dialogue. Its delegation unceremoniously left the UN Summit for the Future in September this year. This disdain and contempt for climate/biodiversity solutions will probably be matched by the incoming US administration’s climate denial disinformation. It is widely predicted that the US will depart from future climate summits. 

Last weekend there was a day of protest demanding climate justice at COP29. The negotiations have been going so slowly that people fear there will not be an increase in the billions of dollars needed each year to help developing countries cope with climate breakdown. “Activists from countries spanning the globe have assembled in a long line at COP29 with artwork and signs from throughout the conference, to show the connectedness of the climate crisis worldwide and urge world leaders to commit to a strong climate finance deal this year,” wrote Oxfam International. 

Speaking in Baku ahead of the latest G20 summit in Brazil, UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell called on wealthy countries to give climate funds and debt relief to the least prosperous and struggling countries, which need to adapt to a crisis that is not of their making. “The G20 was created to tackle problems that no one country, or group of countries, can tackle alone,” he stated. “On that basis, the global climate crisis should be order of business number one in Rio next week.” He also emphasised, “Bolder climate action is basic self-preservation for every G20 economy. Without rapid cuts in emissions, no G20 economy will be spared from climate-driven economic carnage… In turbulent times and a fracturing world, G20 leaders must signal loud and clear that international cooperation is still the best and only chance humanity must survive global heating. There is no other way.”

COP29 comes to an end on Friday November 22, the date this article is being published, so I will have more to report (hopefully some positive news) on the outcome of the conference in my next article, which also looks at the UN COP on desertification being held in Saudi Arabia from December 2 to 13.

“This was the People’s COP! And nobody can take that from us.”

—Susana Muhamad, president of 16th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (COP16) in Colombia

COP16, held in Colombia in October 2024, had 23,000 attendees, the largest number ever in the history of these UN biodiversity conventions. If you wish to have a solid understanding of the key outcomes during the two-week conference, see https://tinyurl.com/cop-outcomes

A global agreement on stopping biodiversity loss cannot come soon enough, as the average size of monitored wildlife populations has plummeted by 73% in just 50 years, according to the Living Planet Report 2024, produced by WWF in collaboration with the Zoological Society of London. Yet just 44 out of 196 countries—22%—had come up with new biodiversity plans by the time COP16 came to a rather abrupt conclusion as attendees were anxious not to miss their flights home.

“Two years on, the vast majority of Nature targets agreed in Montreal regrettably currently still feel like unfunded words on paper,” said Catherine Weller, director of global policy at Fauna & Flora. There is much to do before the next conference, which is scheduled to take place in 2026. It is now clear that the United States, which has not signed up to the treaty, will continue to be on the sidelines for the biodiversity conferences.

The concept of “mainstreaming biodiversity” was lauded at COP16. This means that the impact on biodiversity of any development or action, whether it be local, regional or national, would have to be taken into account and the protection of Nature assured before the project would be permitted to go ahead. But it is not just governments who need to commit to mainstreaming biodiversity, but all of society, as I will discuss in this article.

The link between biodiversity and health was also championed at the conference in terms of national policies, and it was stressed that biodiversity loss is inextricably connected with and detrimental to the health of billions of people. 

After an extra day of negotiations and hard-earned efforts to make breakthroughs for world Indigenous peoples to have a seat at the table with very clear decision-making rights on how negotiations must proceed, it seemed that the city of Cali, where the conference took place, erupted in a celebration for Nature. But amidst these heartfelt demonstrations of joy it cannot go unmentioned that 79 environmental defenders were murdered in Colombia in 2023, more than anywhere else in the world by a wide margin – and this in juxtaposition to having COP16 welcomed in one of the most biodiverse countries on the planet. Clearly a complex struggle is taking place between avarice and national ecological wellbeing, and is as startling as it is horrendous! Tragically, Colombia’s love/hate relationship with Nature reflects what is happening in the rest of the world.

One outcome of the conference is that the delegations from 180-plus countries voted to request that pharmaceutical corporations and other users of digital genetic information give 1% of their revenue to help secure what is called the Cali Fund. This is a new benefit-sharing mechanism for genetic resources. As things stand now, any corporation can take digital genetic information of life on Earth free of charge from three huge databases and not give back any of its profits from this exercise to the countries where that biodiversity is found. Take Moderna, which made US$30 billion from creating one of the vaccines for Covid-19 from many genetic sequences of respiratory viruses. If the 1% levy is implemented, a billion dollars a year could be raised to support global biodiversity, and Indigenous groups would finally be at the centre of the discussions. Sounds fantastic, right? Well, not quite: the corporations are not required to contribute, but will only do so voluntarily, and we all know where those aspirations have taken us in the past… Nowhere.  

“Leaders can show their commitment to real action by breaking the silos for climate-biodiversity action, direct access to finance for Indigenous peoples and local communities who do the real lifting on biodiversity protection, ocean and forest protection, and a payment mechanism for corporations who profit off digital information from Nature to finally pay what they owe to the world for taking these natural resources,” declared An Lambrechts, Biodiversity Politics Expert at Greenpeace International, who went on to say, following the disappointing lack of consensus that pitted the global north, including Canada, against the global south, which desperately needs funds to move forward on biodiversity actions: “Closing the finance gap was not merely some moral obligation, but necessary to the protection of people and Nature that grows more urgent each day… With one week to go until COP29 begins, the non-decision on a fund damages trust between global south and north countries.” 

Perhaps you recall the optimism in evidence at the Montreal biodiversity conference in 2022. All the Canadian federal politicians gave speeches, along with François Legault, the premier of Québec. Steven Guilbeault, Canada’s minister of environment and climate change, was in the middle of negotiations there, and subsequently Canada gave C$200 million to the Global Biodiversity Framework and another C$150 million for developing countries to protect Nature. Even Québec gave millions towards that goal, being the only sub-national state in the world to do so. 

It looked as if Canada was going to be a leader at the Cali summit in Colombia and pass the torch to help implement the 23 targets initiated in Montreal for 2030. But this has not happened. In fact, neither Guilbeault nor any other high-ranking Canadian politician showed up. There was no parliamentary delegation at COP16. Guilbeault blamed the no-show on provincial intransigence. He said provinces like Alberta, Ontario and British Columbia have refused to work closely with the federal government to protect biodiversity.

Still, Guilbeault should have gone to Cali. That would have sent the message that Canada must continue to support the international work for Nature. Bill C-73, the Nature Accountability Act, which has stalled since being introduced in parliament in June 2024, is one example of the lack of political will to set in place critical priorities that are necessary if Canada is to help push back on global biodiversity loss. The aim of the proposed legislation is to hold Canada accountable for its obligations under the Convention on Biological Diversity, including the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, which sets targets to protect biodiversity by 2030.

https://tinyurl.com/Canada-accountability

It’s lamentably the case that most Canadians appear to put little value on protecting Nature in their daily lives. Can this be simply be due to apathy, or is it the outcome of a deliberate attempt to under-educate adult citizens?

Even organizations that profess to take Nature conservation seriously are blindsided by other considerations. As I’ve expressed before in these articles, universities and other educational establishments do not promote care for Nature as their core value and hence embed in their curriculums those Nature commitments, because the people responsible are themselves the product of a century of disengagement with Nature. 

If Bishop’s University, as an example, has no university-wide symposiums on COP16, on COP29 on climate, or on the desertification COP in December, it’s because the mandate to educate young people about biodiversity always takes a back seat. The same lack of enthusiasm on the part of professors and an uninspired administration for encouraging and engaging students in the 2022 COP15 biodiversity conference in Montreal was truly astounding. The student body knew nothing about the most important biodiversity gathering of their lifetime, which was taking place on their doorstep! If people are to move on the climate/biodiversity crisis, the status quo must give way. This is an emergency, and school classes need to reflect that.

Perhaps, instead of having an entire reading week without classes, a day or more can be put aside for students and faculty to reflect on planetary solutions. Sadly, this has not happened. University deans have shown neither mentorship nor leadership regarding these vital concerns. Their future careers should be stained by this failure to act in the interests of their students. 

“If diversity is a source of wonder, its opposite—the ubiquitous condensation to some blandly amorphous and singularly generic modern culture that takes for granted an impoverished environment—is a source of dismay… and re-inventing the poetry of diversity is perhaps the most important challenge of our times.” 

―Wade Davis

“It was among the strongest feelings of grief I have ever encountered. The contrast between the vicious coldness of space and the warm nurturing of Earth below filled me with overwhelming sadness. Every day, we are confronted with the knowledge of further destruction of Earth at our hands: the extinction of animal species, of flora and fauna . . . things that took five billion years to evolve, and suddenly we will never see them again because of the interference of mankind. It filled me with dread. My trip to space was supposed to be a celebration; instead, it felt like a funeral.” 
– William Shatner, reflecting on his trip aboard the Blue Origin space shuttle in 2021

“Peace with Nature” is the theme of the UN COP16 biodiversity summit, which began in Colombia this week. https://www.cop16colombia.com/es/en/ 

To understand better what is taking place at the summit, and what is at stake, read about the history of the UN biodiversity conferences and take a look at what is at its heart: the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), which includes the summit’s goals and 23 targets. https://tinyurl.com/COP16-biodiversity

And here is Canada’s plan to achieve its biodiversity goals: https://tinyurl.com/Canada-commitment

WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) has reviewed the world’s National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans and has revealed that the majority of countries are not fully honouring their commitments to halt and reverse Nature loss by 2030. In fact, only 10% of countries have submitted their updated plans for Nature. WWF has put out a tracker to show the current tangible action plans of individual nations to protect Nature. Which countries are doing best? Find out at https://tinyurl.com/WWF-Nature-tracker

Unlike the annual UN climate change conference, the biodiversity summit only takes place every two years. Few heads of government attend it, and many thousand fewer people come than to the extravaganzas that are the climate change COPs, with all their slick negotiating groups and lobbyists (who often outnumber individual nation states’ delegates). It is utterly disgraceful that the United States hasn’t even ratified the GBF and essentially remains silent throughout the two weeks.

There have never been binding resolutions to lower carbon emissions, and nor have the biodiversity conferences conjured up real wins for Nature, although the December 2022 Montreal summit broke through some of the entrenched anti-Nature propaganda to move forward on giving Indigenous and global south voices a more powerful presence and voice. However, the lion’s share of financial benefits, including the possession and monetizing of digital sequence information (DSI) on genetic resources, still goes to the global north, when it is all too obvious that the southern hemisphere’s intact biosphere is what props up and feeds the massive extractive and consumeristic way of life of Canadians and Americans.

The goals of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity include DSI justice, halting human-induced extinction of threatened species and reducing the rate of extinction of all species tenfold by 2050, the sustainable use and management of biodiversity to ensure that Nature’s contributions to humans are valued, maintained and enhanced, and that adequate means of implementing the GBF be accessible to all parties, particularly least developed countries and small island developing states.

Not very long ago it was thought that plutocracies in the global north could pontificate with impunity on matters of carbon, fossil fuels, energy and economic success stories, and at the same time eke out some sort of ceasefire and even placate climate/biodiversity scientists and activists with false promises, without mentioning the real-in-your-face collapse of Nature, while the entreaties of the global south were barely noticeable. This greenwashing on the part of the fossil fuel industries is hardly in practice now because a new no-holds-barred acceleration of the oil/gas agenda has taken over. Empowered and emboldened by right-wing governments, they just don’t care what the scientific evidence presents.

This attitude reflects the Cartesian mind/body split that has caused over the centuries such suffering throughout the ecological world and beyond. The health of the Earth’s living body can’t be a separate issue from any other activity we might pursue. If governments truly wanted the biodiversity crisis to disappear, the biodiversity conference would have had equal status almost 30 years ago to the climate one, instead of being its poor cousin. 

For many governments, including the general public, climate is a problem that until recently could be endlessly put off and therefore appeared more theoretical in nature. The climate summit has always had conflicting information showcased, and in many instances belligerent actors have torn down the case for immediate fossil fuel reductions that would give way to an overwhelming push for renewable energy and a lowering of carbon emissions. Now we know that an expanded and massive renewable infrastructure only enhances oil/gas production and gives more electricity to a spiralling artificial intelligence industry expansion, and at the same time emissions still rise to accommodate the insatiable greed of the global economy and technology.

The crucial matter of biosphere integrity is what any rational discussion should start with. There ain’t anything hypothetical about it. We either protect (and hopefully love) the Earth, or we destroy ourselves. That sentiment is hard to inculcate into classrooms when universities like Bishop’s are practically moribund when it comes to giving the general student population, and not just an elite few, the skills and the passion that would change the present curriculum apathy and turn around the overwhelming grief expressed by many students that accompanies the planetary crisis. The University of California at San Diego has made the right decision. Beginning in autumn 2024, all incoming students are required to take a class on climate change in order to graduate. https://tinyurl.com/courses-on-climate

Susana Muhamad, the president of COP16 Colombia, who quit working for Shell years ago, had this to say about the goals of the conference: “The added value of holding COP16 in Colombia lies in our vision of ‘Peace with Nature’ and in recognizing that the real struggle of the 21st century is for life. If we succeed in transforming our relationship with Nature, as well as our production and consumption practices, and get collective actions to promote life instead of destroying it, we will be addressing the most important challenges of our time.”

As you will see, several world gatherings are taking place over the next two months. I will be writing about each of them. The first is COP16 of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Cali, Colombia fromOctober 21 to November 1 (also referred to as the Nature COP). This will be followed by COP29 of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Baku, Azerbaijan from November 11 to 22 (also referred to as the climate COP), and COP16 of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), hosted in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from

December 2 to 13 (also referred to as the desertification COP).

If you find these large UN conferences daunting, you might be heartened by the existence of groups such as the Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network International (WECAN), who will be present at COP16 in Colombia to champion the Rights of Nature. https://www.wecaninternational.org

Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring is a masterpiece that brings out all the interwoven magical world of Nature, but—even better—the oldest all-star band in existence is hitting the airwaves and raising millions to be spent on rejuvenating our biosphere. The name of the band is Nature. Nature is officially an artist! Listen to her music! https://www.soundsright.earth