Nouvelles des groupes
- Détails
- Publié par : Jean Louis Deveau
- Affichages : 9817
New Brunswickers are invited to read the Environmental Impact Assessment document for the snowmobile grooming hub project and to please make their comments/concerns known to both the Department of Tourism and Department of Environment. A pdf of this report may be found on the web at: http://www2.gnb.ca/content/dam/gnb/Departments/env/pdf/EIA-EIE/Registrations-Engegistrements/documents/EIARegistration1444.pdf
Jean Louis Deveau
- Détails
- Publié par : Caroline Lubbe-D'Arcy
- Affichages : 11773
http://www.acadienouvelle.com/actualites/2016/08/24/glyphosate-occupation-pacifique-contre-larrosage-restigouche-video/?pgnc=1
http://ici.radio-canada.ca/regions/atlantique/2016/08/24/015-acadie-nouveau-brunswick-epandage-herbicide-kedgwick.shtml
MEDIA RELEASE: AUGUST 23, 2016
COMMUNIQUE DE PRESSE URGENT 23 AOUT, 2016
Les joyeux campeurs protegent notre avenir et nos forets
(ENGLISH TEXT FOLLOWS)
Dans le Restigouche ouest, un groupe communautaire avait depuis trois mois l'intention d'occuper une clearcutting qui devait être arrosé cette année avec l'herbicide glyphosate. « Nous devons cesser d'empoisonner nos forêts, protéger la faune et la flore, et sauver l'environnement pour les générations à venir », a déclaré Francine Levesque, membre du groupe EcoVie, situé dans la région de Kedgwick-Saint-Quentin.
Plus tôt cette semaine , un site a été choisi pour établir un campement pour protéger l'environnement . « Le plan original était de garder l'action en silence, » a déclaré Jean MacDonald, un autre membre de EcoVie. « Mais vous savez que nous sommes dans une petite communauté. Il est devenu difficile de garder tout cela en silence, étant donné l'intérêt des gens pour arrêter l'arrosage. Quelqu'un passe près de notre camp et a pris des photos et a été le partage sur Facebook.»
« Maintenant, nous recevons plusieurs offres de support », a déclaré Francine . « Nous ne sommes seulement un petit groupe de personnes . Nous aurions souhaite que le plan d'action soit dévoilé lors de la réunion mensuelle du groupe de la Paix et de l'Amitié (Peace & Friendship Alliance) le samedi 27 Août à Kedgwick River. L'Alliance comprend acadienne , autochtone et anglophone du Nouveau-Brunswick qui sont fortement opposés à l'arrosage. Mais presentement le chat est sorti du sac " .
Les “Joyeux campeurs” sont maintenant situés sur le Chemin de la Shop a Savon, un peu en dehors de la route 17 , près de l'ancienne église de White’s Brook. Un code très sévère de l'éthique et de la non-violence sont mis en application sur le site.
(English next page)
Happy Campers Protecting our Future and our Forest
In Restigouche West, a community group has had plans for three months to occupy clearcuts scheduled to be sprayed with Glyphosate herbicide. “We need to stop this poisoning of the woods, to bring back the wildlife, and protect the environment for future generations,” said Francine Levesque, a member of EcoVie, which is centred in the Kedgwick and Saint Quentin communities.
Earlier this week, a site was chosen to make this stand for the environment. “The original plan was to keep the action under wraps,” said Jean MacDonald, another member of EcoVie. “But you know how it is in a small community. Someone went by and took photos of the camp we are setting up, and put them on FaceBook. We could not keep it quiet because so many people around here oppose the spraying.”
“Now we are getting many offers of support,” says Francine. “We are just a few people. We had hoped to wait to announce to the media until this Saturday, August 27, when the provincial Peace & Friendship Alliance network will be having its monthly meeting in Kedgwick River. The Alliance is made up of Indigenous, Acadian, and Anglophone New Brunswickers who are very opposed to the spraying. But I guess the cat is out of the bag.”
The “Happy Campers” site is located on Chemin de la Shop a Savon, just off Highway 17. Travel in White's Brook Road by the old church about 4.5 km, and then turn right when you come to a “T” in the road. A very tight code of ethics and non-violence is being enforced at the site.
- Détails
- Affichages : 12151
À quelle distance de votre maison se trouve la coupe à blanc des Terres de la couronne la plus proche? Et est-ce cette coupe à blanc se trouve sur la liste à être arrosée d’herbicides cette année? Vous pouvez jetez un coup d’œil à cette carte pour le découvrir si vous en avez envie. Mais laissez-moi vous avertir, vous ne voulez vraiment pas le savoir. Pour moi, les avions à arrosage seront à environ 2 km. Et l’écoulement des régions arrosées ira dans le ruisseau qui coule tout près de chez-moi et eh oui, devinez quoi d’autre, l’eau de ce ruisseau irrigue mon jardin de légumes. Hmmm…..miam. Et ne mentionnons pas la dérive aérienne qui fera son chemin.
Une des choses les plus incroyables de ce scénario est que nous payons pour l’arrosage avec nos taxes. La Vérificatrice générale, dans son rapport de 2015, a critiqué le gouvernement pour avoir perdu $53,67 millions lors des derniers 5 ans sur leurs opérations forestières dû aux coûts de sylviculture, incluant l’arrosage. Elle n’avait rien de bon à dire au sujet des coupes à blanc et recommandait que nous en fassions moins, pas plus. Elle a noté que des méthodes de coupe sélective et partiale sont reconnues comme étant les meilleures pratiques de gestion et elles protègent aussi l’eau, l’habitat naturel et préservent la biodiversité.
Quelle est le rapport entre la coupe à blanc et l’arrosage? Les coupes à blanc sont arrosées d’herbicides et ensuite on y plante des arbres résineux. Au NB, la forêt naturelle comprend des résineux et des feuillus. Suite à une coupe à blanc, les deux types d’arbres repoussent par eux-mêmes à partir des graines et des plantules qui se trouvent dans la région naturellement. Les herbicides tuent les feuillus, mais pas les résineux. Les résineux font du meilleur bois d’œuvre alors l’objectif de l’arrosage est de tuer les feuillus en plein élan.
Et qu’arrive-t-il ailleurs? D’après le rapport du gouvernement, le glyphosate utilisé ici est différent de celui partout ailleurs. Mondialement, 90% du glyphosate est utilisé en agriculture. Au NB, 61% est utilisé en foresterie, 27% en industrie (pensez Énergie NB et au MTI), et 11% en agriculture. Le rapport a trouvé que 40% des terres forestières coupées au NB en 2014 ont été arrosé avec du glyphosate. La moyenne canadienne est de 11%. Et le Québec, qui a coupé presque 3 fois plus de bois que le NB, n’a pas arrosé du tout!
Imaginez ce qui pourrait arriver si nous arrêtions de payer les compagnies forestières pour larguer ce poison sur nos têtes? Est-ce que les résultats financiers de la province seraient améliorés? Est-ce ces millions de dollars pourraient être mieux dépensés sur la santé et l’éducation? Je pense que oui!
Plus d’info
Lien à la carte d’arrosage GeoNB en ligne (Une fois rendu à GeoNB, cliquez le bouton « OK » en bas à droite. Si vous cliquez sur l’hyperlien, vous verrez la vidéo perspective de la compagnie forestière. Une fois que vous vous trouvez sur la carte, vous devrez agrandir et attendre un peu pour voir les régions qu’on planifie arroser.)
Lien au rapport sur le glyphosate du gouvernement et aux réactions des groupes environnementaux
Lien à la Déclaration de novembre 2015 des groupes demandant une nouvelle loi sur les terres de la couronne
Lien vers Stop Spraying NB
Liens vers le Conseil de conservation du Nouveau-Brunswick
Stop Spraying New Brunswick calls for human health, wildlife health studies and immediate moratorium
- Détails
- Publié par : Terry Wishart
- Affichages : 10875
New Brunswick’s acting Chief Medical Officer (CMO) Dr. Jennifer Russell has concluded that there is no need to stop glyphosate forest spraying at this time in NB. After review of the Glyphosate report released by the Chief Medical Officer of New Brunswick on July 26, 2016, Stop Spraying New Brunswick group calls for an immediate moratorium on forest spraying and the start of human and wildlife health studies.
“What I saw was a report that acknowledged that the use of Glyphosate is contentious,” says Peter Gilbert, co-organizer of Stop Spraying New Brunswick. ”Some say it’s okay and some say it’s not. There are provinces, states, countries and scientific authorities on both sides of this debate. That in itself is enough reason to press pause on the use of this controversial herbicide.“
“The extent of forest spraying in this province and the dramatic drop in the deer population are two compelling reasons to launch a major health study immediately in NB including humans and large forest animals”, says Dr. Caroline Lubbe-D’Arcy, co-organizer of stop Spraying New Brunswick.
New Brunswick is seeing an increase in forest spraying as a result of the 2014 Forest Management Strategy, which allows for more Crown forest clearcuts than before with resulting plantations that are managed by herbicide spraying. 40% of cut forest was sprayed in 2014, a much higher percentage than any other province in Canada.
“Canadian Environmental Protection Law recognizes that the protection of the environment is essential to the well-being of Canadians,” says Francine Levesque from Écovie, Kedgwick River. “It includes a precautionary principle that says that "lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation" and "The application of this principle is a legitimate and distinct decision-making approach within risk management". This principle should be used in NB at this moment with glyphosate since we have the second-highest cancer rate In Canada (Statistics 2015).”
Clearly something is wrong as we are witnessing with large mammals (other than humans) living in our forests. One only has to look at the significant drop and change in distribution of New Brunswick’s deer population. Our deer population is now a quarter of what it was 30 years ago (New Brunswick’s deer population has plummeted from 270,000 to 74,000 over the past 3 decades). Data comparing New Brunswick, Maine and Québec show that the deer harvest numbers in New Brunswick have decreased to 15% of 1985 LEVELS, whereas numbers are up 300% in Québec and have remained stable in Maine. Québec has had a ban on forest spraying since 2001.
It should be noted that it has been reported that deer will not eat sprayed vegetation and that they will migrate to find food in unsprayed areas, but their supply of food is diminishing due to increased clearcuts and herbicide spraying. Moose however, will eat sprayed vegetation so the health of these large mammals should be studied. If there is no risk this needs to be proven and not assumed. A study would help answer several important questions since a large percentage of our population hunts moose and fishes for food. Is their meat and organ tissue tested for the presence of this chemical?
“New Brunswick’s wildlife such as deer and moose are our canaries in the coal mine with respect to forest spraying," says Dr. Caroline Lubbe-D'Arcy. “Stop Spraying New Brunswick (SSNB) is asking for an immediate health study to be launched on humans and large mammals in New Brunswick as well as an immediate moratorium or outright ban on forest spraying. Our acting CMO should be applying the precautionary principle and not use the New Brunswick rural population as guinea pigs."
- Détails
- Publié par : Corey Robichaud
- Affichages : 9885
The report confirms what we have long feared — that the forest industry uses more glyphosate in NB operations than any other province in Canada.
The report found that 40% of the forest land cut in NB in 2014 was sprayed with glyphosate compared to 28% in Ontario, 21% in Alberta, 18% in Manitoba and only 11% in Nova Scotia.
While 205,859 hectares were cut in Québec in the same year, no forest lands there were sprayed with glyphosate.
The analysis puts the key public policy question squarely back into the government’s hands. Namely, why, of all places in Canada, is NB spending so much taxpayer money on our companies’ spray programs when other jurisdictions, like Vermont and Québec, get on fine without it.
The report did discuss the human health risk associated with glyphosate. While it recognizes that there are many outstanding questions that need to be examined by Health Canada and its Pesticide Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) in its long overdue re-evaluation of the chemical, the report says human health risks can be reduced if its label restrictions are properly followed.
The OCMOH points out that public health agencies in Canada and elsewhere have adopted a “wait and see” approach. The PMRA is currently reassessing glyphosate. The review of glyphosate, not expected until 2017, was delayed due to what the OCMOH called “rapidly-evolving new information.”
Beyond the scope of the OCMOH’s report are other concerns related to glyphosate use in forestry that weigh heavily on the minds of New Brunswickers. These concerns need to be addressed by our provincial government and include the environmental impacts of the use of glyphosate on deer, moose and aquatic species, and on water quality.
The report points out the uncertainty surrounding glyphosate use world-wide. Some European countries, like France, Sweden, Italy and the Netherlands, are arguing for a complete ban of its use in both agriculture and forestry. We believe that this supports our recommendation that a prudent action would be to stop using it in forestry operations, especially since more responsible alternatives are available and their use, in fact, would create more jobs.
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Additional Information
- NB farmers use less glyphosate than those in other provinces, primarily due to the fact that NB grows fewer bushels of genetically modified corn and soybeans.
- Québec banned herbicide use in its forests in 2001 due to public concern over human health impacts of spraying. Vermont, which has a similar forest type to New Brunswick, also stopped using herbicides in their forests, almost two decades ago, in 1997.
- NB’s Auditor General recommended in her 2015 report that public forests should be managed for economic, environmental and social values, and highlighted that the province has lost money from the management of public forests for at least the last five years.
- To see where NB forest will be sprayed this summer, click here.
- Détails
- Publié par : Terry Wishart
- Affichages : 11190
Opponents push alternative to Mt. Carleton gas bar and snowmobile trail on mountain
Fredericton - A perfectly good alternative to developments being proposed for within Mt. Carleton Park exists outside the wilderness park, say people dead-set against an enlarged snowmobile circuit and gas bar being promoted by the Province.
Jean Louis Deveau is spokesman for a group of citizens concerned about the expanding presence of snow machines in the Park and their impact on wildlife. The group is advancing alternative locations to keep the park free of new infrastructure and what they view as incompatible use by motorized vehicles in New Brunswick’s only designated wilderness park.
Governor's Lodge at Popple Depot, located east of the park, is one such alternative and is at the centre of a proposed snowmobile ‘hub.’ “From my understanding, Governor’s Lodge has the space for sled gatherings and it also sells gas,” Deveau, a former manager at Mt. Carleton said Tuesday.
“Why build new infrastructure to enable sleds to gas up in a wilderness park when there are already private establishments in the area offering the services they want?” Deveau asks. Taxpayers would pay for the gas dispensary being proposed for the park, whereas the gas dispensary at Popple Depot was paid for by the private sector.
“By putting a new gas bar in the park, the Province may well disadvantage or even handicap Governor’s Lodge and other privately owned gas distributors in the area. Won’t that defeat the Province’s goals of trying to create new jobs with this project?” Deveau said.
Park advocates including Deveau have launched a legal challenge to force the government to abandon the scheme to infringe on the Park, and to follow its own legislation. A crowdfunding campaign on gofundme.com was launched in June to help cover legal fees. The court is scheduled to hear the case on September 2nd in Woodstock.
The Parks Act (2014) stipulates a management plan based on a zoning system must be completed prior to any development in Provincial Parks. Mt. Carleton has been zoned but doesn’t have a management plan.
