Current Protected Areas and Conservation in the Highlands Corridor
Our Strategy for Expanding Protected Areas
The Highlands Corridor offers a nature-based solution to building climate change resilience, protecting lands and waters, and maintaining biodiversity and natural connectivity.
The Highlands Corridor is comprised of Crown land, municipal land and private land. Its long-term protection will require partnerships and collaboration among provincial and municipal governments, First Nations, industry, non-government organizations and private landowners.
A strategy for protection requires a commitment to consultation, collaboration and action, as outlined below.
Ontario Government
Under the authority of the Public Lands Act, the 60,551 ha of unceded Crown land in the Highlands Corridor are currently managed by the Ministry of Northern Development, Mining, Natural Resources and Forestry (NDMNRF). Through its land use planning processes, NDMNRF determines how Crown land can be used and assigns to a specific area a primary land use designation. Aggregate extraction and commercial forest harvesting are permitted on the unceded Crown land in the Highlands Corridor. There are currently six active aggregate sites and the Bancroft Minden Forest Company identifies ~10,000 ha that are to be commercially harvested during the 2021-2031 operating schedule.
Aggregate extraction on Crown land may result in detrimental loss of climate change resilience and biodiversity as well as a lost opportunity for protected lands and waters. Therefore, the Ontario Government must do the following:
Apply interim protection measures to pause aggregate and mining development within the Highlands Corridor while consultation about opportunities for protection is undertaken.
Provincial parks and conservation reserves are administered under the Provincial Parks and Conservation Reserves Act by the Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks (MECP). The Haliburton Highlands Land Trust and Glenside Ecological Services Limited initiated consultation with an MECP biologist and the superintendents of Queen Elizabeth II and Kawartha Highlands Provincial Parks. Connectivity and biodiversity are important management considerations and staff at both parks recognize that a landscape conservation strategy, such as the Highlands Corridor, can enhance connectivity and protect biodiversity. It was recommended by the Kawartha Highlands Provincial Park superintendent that a report on the Highlands Corridor be submitted directly to Minister Piccini (MECP) for dissemination to the appropriate departments for further assessment (Smith, 2021).
Through Crown land use planning it is possible to establish the land use intent to regulate areas as provincial parks or conservation reserves, or additions to provincial parks or conservation reserves. Such designations offer a high level of protection of natural heritage values suitable to the Highlands Corridor. Following a land use decision designating an area as a Recommended Provincial Park or Recommended Conservation Reserve, the policies applied during interim protection are replaced by the policies of the new designation. Once designated as a Recommended Provincial Park or Recommended Conservation Reserve the area can be regulated as a provincial park or conservation reserve under the Provincial Parks and Conservation Reserves Act (PPCRA). Precedents for this approach were the 58 new provincial parks and 268 new conservation reserves which were created under Ontario’s Living Legacy in 1999, with a total area protected of almost 2 million hectares.
Therefore, it is imperative that the Ontario Government do the following:
Explore opportunities for further protection of Crown lands within the Highlands Corridor through an assessment of life and earth science significance, and forestry values.
Municipal Government
Protection of the Highlands Corridor will not be feasible without support at the municipal level. The Haliburton Highlands Land Trust delivered a delegation to the County of Haliburton, Municipality of Trent Lakes and Township of North Kawartha and all three municipalities passed resolutions supporting the HHLT’s conservation efforts in the Highlands Corridor. The County of Haliburton recently developed a Community Climate Action Plan with the aim to reduce local greenhouse gas emissions from the broader community and better prepare for and adapt to a changing climate. One of the strategies identified was to protect natural assets with specific reference to the Highlands Corridor.
Lands within the Highlands Corridor include municipal parks and private lands, and therefore protection and conservation of the natural infrastructure will require a collaborative and local effort towards good stewardship. Snowdon Municipal Park is in the Highlands Corridor and represents 190 ha of natural habitat. Through consultation with the Township of Minden Hills the Council passed a resolution of support for defining Snowdon Municipal Park as a Protected Area and submitting data for inclusion in the Canadian Protected and Conserved Areas Database (CPCAD).
Industry
The Bancroft Minden Forest Company (BMFC) holds the Sustainable Forest License for all the Crown land in the Highlands Corridor. In their 2021-2031 management plan, the BMFC identified 8,547 ha of regular, bridging and contingency harvest areas in the Highlands Corridor.
The BMFC is a certified Forest Manager to FSC® standards and therefore is committed to achieving sustainability in their forestry operations. The HHLT recognizes that managed forests support a broad range of biodiversity yet can also be detrimental to some sensitive ecosystems and/or species. The Haliburton Highlands Land Trust is in consultation with the BMFC to identify opportunities for further protection of Crown land through the establishment of Crown Protection Areas, Conservation Reserves and/or Enhanced Management Areas within the Corridor.
First Nations
The Highlands Corridor is situated on the Anishinaabe lands covered by Treaty 20 Michi Saagiig territory and the traditional territory of the Michi Saagiig and Chippewa Nations, collectively known as the Williams Treaties First Nations, which include Curve Lake, Hiawatha, Alderville, Scugog Island, Rama, Beausoleil and Georgina Island First Nations.
The Haliburton Highlands Land Trust and Glenside Ecological Services acknowledge and affirm the inherent right of the Williams Treaties First Nations to make decisions about activities within their ancestral and treaty lands, including the protection of the Highlands Corridor.
Both Canada and Ontario have committed to implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People (UNDRIP). A key principle of UNDRIP is the right to free, prior and informed consent regarding land and resource use within Indigenous ancestral territories. Affirmation of Indigenous rights and responsibilities requires that affected Indigenous Nations be able to provide free, prior and informed consent before any protected areas which affect them are established through legislation. Consultation must occur on a government-to-government basis and, therefore, the duty to consult can be legally satisfied only by the Crown.
The Haliburton Highlands Land Trust is committed to respectfully engaging with the Williams Treaties First Nations, according to community protocols, to discuss the protection of the Highlands Corridor in the spirit and practice of reconciliation.
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs)
Non-governmental organizations have a critical role in the protection of the Highlands Corridor. This includes research, communications, dialogue with First Nations, public engagement, landowner engagement and securement of private properties for conservation. As the lead on the Highlands Corridor project, the Haliburton Highlands Land Trust has integrated the Highlands Corridor project into their strategic plan for land acquisition and conservation, community outreach and education, and building partnerships.
The Haliburton Highlands Land Trust owns, manages and protects 250 ha of land in the Highlands Corridor, consisting of two properties known as the Dahl Forest and the Fred and Pearl Barry Wetland Reserve. The Kawartha Land Trust owns, manages and protects another 40 ha identified as Vincent Woods. Through the ownership and management of these properties, the Land Trusts protect provincially significant wetlands, species at risk, and biodiversity. As the properties are located adjacent to Crown land, the Dahl Forest, Barry Wetland Reserve and Vincent Woods enhance landscape connectivity thereby building ecological and climate change resilience.
Private Landowners
Although Crown land represents 60% of the Highlands Corridor, private landowners with an interest in landscape conservation and good stewardship will have an important role in bridging gaps between the protected lands of the Highlands Corridor. Through analyzing landscape connectivity and wildlife movement in the Highlands Corridor, the HHLT identified private properties in the Highlands Corridor that maintain connectivity, biodiversity and build climate change resilience. HHLT reached out to these private landowners to inform them about the Highlands Corridor and invite them to become HHLT Partners in Conservation through a commitment to good stewardship. For landowners with larger properties, the HHLT assisted them in developing a site-specific management plan with actions targeting environmental protection and wildlife habitat. Landowners with management plans were enrolled in the Ontario Managed Forest Tax Incentive Program, thereby providing a tax incentive to the landowner, while enforcing compliance with the prescribed stewardship actions. HHLT Partners in Conservation now steward over 2800 ha of private land in the Highlands Corridor thereby building connectivity and protecting biodiversity in the Highland Corridor.
Join our Partners in Conservation Program: https://www.highlandscorridor.ca/partners-in-conservation-program/