Conservationists call for greater protection of NWT peatlands

The NWT government has devoted insufficient policy attention to the territory’s peatlands, a new report from the Wildlife Conservation Society Canada states.

WCS Canada released a proposed National Peatland Strategy on Thursday alongside action plans for each province and territory, including the NWT.

The reports examined existing policy for peatland conservation across the country and made recommendations to better protect areas increasingly at risk due to climate change, human development and resource extraction.

The work was informed by what the organization refers to as “peatland knowledge holders” – people working in these areas or making decisions that impact them, such as those in mining and forestry.

In the territory, this included the GNWT as well as about four other groups, said Victoria Goodday, a policy lead at WCS Canada and the lead author of the strategy.

“We asked them about what they needed to achieve better outcomes for these ecosystems, and what were some of the barriers to protecting, restoring and stewarding peatlands in Canada,” Goodday said.

About a quarter of the world’s remaining peatland can be found in Canada, Goodday said, and the NWT has the country’s second-largest area covered by peatland after Ontario.

Peatlands are the world’s largest terrestrial carbon store, capturing about 150 billion tons of carbon.

“We have a global obligation, a moral and strategic obligation, to pay specific attention to peatlands,” said Goodday.

One of the calls to action from Thursday’s report was to improve mapping of peatlands in the NWT, to better understand the geographic boundaries of the ecosystems and how they might be changing over time.

“Northwest Territories peatlands have been so impacted by fire on the landscape, any data or information that was collected before in those areas – before the fires –would need to now be collected again, so it’s kind-of about continuous mapping and data collection,” said Goodday.

She said this lack of documented peatlands inventory has been a barrier to action in the territory, and the NWT could look to provinces such as Alberta, Manitoba and Québec to learn from their mapping techniques.

The NWT also needs stronger policy when it comes to recognizing and protecting peatlands as new development occurs, including in the mining and forestry sectors, the report suggested.

The GNWT is told it should require that environmental assessments include baselines studies of any peatlands that sit in a project area, including carbon storage and greenhouse gas emissions.

“There is a big role there for industry – and government that’s regulating that industry – to make them avoid major impacts to peatlands,” said Goodday.

Global significance

The NWT could also look to the Yukon for inspiration, Goodday said.

Yukon released a wetlands stewardship policy in 2023, though the implementation details are still being worked out.

Goodday said some provinces have centred peatland restoration in their policies, but she suggests governments avoid disturbing these areas in the first place.

“A lot of the law and policy across the country focuses on restoration as a solution, but we need to shift perspective and focus on avoiding harm because again, that carbon that’s stored in the peatland is released to the atmosphere as soon as that peatland is drained and disturbed,” said Goodday.

“Even if that peatland is restored in 20, 30 years, it’s a huge impact. It’s a huge climate impact and it’s a huge loss to the landscape, and the communities that depend on the landscapes for those 20 to 30 years.”

She describes peatlands as “irreplaceable” compared to other wetlands due to their ability to store carbon.

While one of the most imminent threats to peatlands could be the drought affecting the water table across much of the territory, Goodday said she heard from community members at GNWT workshops earlier this year about Indigenous-led stewardship that can help mitigate some of the effects of climate change.

She pointed to practices such as cultural or prescribed burns that can help reduce the image and range of wildfires.

“There’s a bunch of different practices already in Indigenous cultures that can be scaled up to help make the landscape more resilient,” said Goodday.

One of the biggest takeaways from the report, Goodday said, is the need for coordinated action across jurisdictions to preserve the NWT’s peatlands – like federal support and perhaps international resources to support the GNWT and Indigenous governments in their stewardship.

“Maybe it shouldn’t just fall to the territory itself, because these areas are of such global significance,” said Goodday.