Valuing and preserving B.C. parks and protected areas

By Mary Polak

Minister of Environment

Recently, proposed amendments to the Park Act were introduced in the legislature to provide clarity for certain activities within B.C.’s provincial parks. Included in the proposed amendments is the issuing of permits for research and information gathering.

To be absolutely clear, these proposed amendments do not allow, promote or otherwise enable industrial projects in parks and protected areas. Recent suggestions that future mining or forestry or other industrial operations will be allowed in parks are simply not true. The Park Act prohibits industrial activity in parks and this will not change with Bill 4.

Currently, issuing research permits is not authorized under the Park Act. That is why we are proposing these amendments; to ensure studies that improve knowledge of potential park impacts can be undertaken in provincial parks.

Research and information gathering activities could include such things as soil sampling for archaeological assessments, collection of plant and animal specimens, or the installation of gauges and instruments to measure environmental conditions. Research can be purely for academic purposes, or as part of an environmental assessment.

Providing for research activities in provincial parks allows us to obtain more fulsome information. This is vital in making informed decisions, and will be especially important if requests for adjustments to park boundaries are eventually proposed.