There has been a buzz since the beginning of the month when scientists and researchers marched on Parliament Hill in Ottawa. The journal Nature reported that this “highlighted a level of unease in the Canadian scientific community that is unprecedented in living memory”. The question people need to ask is why have typically measured and dispassionate scientists have taken to the streets?
A paramount issue is that since arriving in office, the current Administration has significantly cut funding for fundamental science, environmental science and advice on emerging best practices and models for sustainable development. These acts include:
- axing the Research Tools and Instruments (RTI) grant used by scientists to procure appropriate instrumentation for experimental science;
- closing the internationally reputable Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Lab (PEARL) will soon be closed – a lab fundamental to monitoring the northern atmosphere and thus the rapidly growing effects of climate change;
- eliminating the Experimental Lakes Area (ELA), a research station and collection of research lakes, that since 1968, has been seminal in establishing the impacts of pollutants such as phosphates and mercury on water quality and habitat, the evidence of acid rain and the impacts of wetland flooding on greenhouse gas emissions; and
- dismantling the 24-year old expert advisory body, the National Round Table on Environment and Economy (NRTEE), a purveyor of best available knowledge on sustainable development.
Together these cuts do not add up to a windfall savings, but they do raise questions about the types of information required to advance our society and the ways advancement and prosperity are interpreted into our political and decision-making structures. As a nation, we must consider what we hold dear, what the goals for a sustainable future look like and the tools and programs necessary to help us achieve that future. If scientific evidence about the nature of these details are sacrificed along the way, does it not follow that our ability to navigate and monitor a prosperous and sustainable course may also be sacrificed?