{"id":12007,"date":"2025-11-23T13:12:02","date_gmt":"2025-11-23T16:12:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/2025\/11\/23\/how-b-c-municipal-contributions-to-canadas-30x30-conservation-goal-are-adding-up\/"},"modified":"2025-11-23T13:12:02","modified_gmt":"2025-11-23T16:12:02","slug":"how-b-c-municipal-contributions-to-canadas-30x30-conservation-goal-are-adding-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/2025\/11\/23\/how-b-c-municipal-contributions-to-canadas-30x30-conservation-goal-are-adding-up\/","title":{"rendered":"How B.C. municipal contributions to Canadas 30\u00d730 conservation goal are adding up"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>British ColumbiaCities and towns across B.C. are trying to help the country meet an ambitious conservation goal of protecting 30 per cent of its lands and waters by 2030. While the square kilometres are adding up, Canada needs to double what\u2019s been done so far to meet its goal.Protected lands in cities and towns now part of federal database, but millions of hectares still neededChad Pawson  \u00b7 CBC News  \u00b7 Posted: Nov 23, 2025 8:00 AM EST | Last Updated: 3 hours agoListen to this articleEstimated 4 minutesThe audio version of this article is generated by text-to-speech, a technology based on artificial intelligence.The view at Minnekhada Regional Park in Coquitlam, B.C. The park is listed in a federal database of protected lands in Canada. (Nav Rahi\/CBC News)Cities and towns across B.C. are trying to help the country meet an ambitious conservation goal of protecting 30 per cent of its lands and waters by 2030, and while the square kilometres are adding up, the country still needs millions more.\u201cWe might not achieve the 30X30, but we\u2019ve made a huge effort and we\u2019ve increased peoples\u2019 awareness of the importance of biodiversity within their local areas,\u201d said Andrew Banks with B.C. Nature.The organization, a federation of 65 naturalist groups, has had a small team of workers aiding municipal governments through a national program to assess lands that meet federal criteria for inclusion in the Canadian Protected and Conserved Areas Database.The conservation is meant to help Canada mitigate climate change.In 2024 alone, several municipalities such as Vancouver, Bowen Island and the Village of Lions Bay have contributed square kilometres of parks or natural areas that are off limits to development.\u201cIt\u2019s just natural forest,\u201d said Lions Bay Coun. Neville Abbott about the nearly 0.15 square kilometres added to the database this past summer, which is at the base of a North Shore mountain that provides vital wildlife habitat, in addition to being a hiking destination.Lions Bay has around 1,400 residents, and many strongly associate with protecting its surrounding nature.\u201cAlthough we have a very small amount of land in the village of Lions Bay it was just, \u2018What can we do to be part of this and help achieve that 30X30 goal?\u2019\u201d Abbott said.Village of Lions Bay Coun. Neville Abbott stands on a hiking trail that is part of a protected, natural area in the municipality that\u2019s now part of Canada\u2019s 30X30 conservation goal. (Hunter Soo\/CBC)Several B.C. communities are saying the same about sites close to or in urban settings that have some of the most valuable natural parcels of land in the country, according to Banks.\u201cWe need to promote that and we need to let people know and acknowledge and be aware of biodiversity in these areas,\u201d Banks said \u201cAnd this program allows that.\u201dBanks made the comments from Metro Vancouver\u2019s Minnekhada Regional Park, which features forest, marsh and rocky outcroppings for plants and wildlife near Coquitlam, a suburb city of nearly 150,000 residents.More than 90 per cent of the park was registered with the federal 30X30 database this past summer, \u201cshowing how protecting the parks and green spaces people love in their own communities can drive real progress,\u201d said Dylan Rawlyk, with Nature Canada in a release announcing it.How close is Canada to meeting 30X30?Ottawa first made the 30X30 goal in 2020 with a formal commitment in 2022. It\u2019s part of world-wide efforts to protect lands and waters to safeguard life on the planet that\u2019s at risk from climate change.Conservationists like Shelley Luce with Sierra Club B.C. say the goal is an \u201cabsolutely critical milestone.\u201cAll of the services that we depend on, all the processes that occur in the natural world around us really need at least 30 per cent of the planet in order to function properly in a way that supports all of us people.\u201dThe latest federal data from December 2024 shows Canada has protected around 14 per cent of its lands and 16 per cent of its waters, meaning it requires nearly double of what\u2019s been done so far to meet the goal.The needed 1.6 million square kilometres is \u201ca lot,\u201d Luce said. \u201cWe won\u2019t find that within municipalities.\u201dLuce is calling on governments, like B.C.\u2019s, to do more conservation that could qualify for the 30X30 goal.In B.C., the Sierra Club has called on the province for years to transition away from logging old-growth forests, with its latest report saying despite a commitment five years ago, deferments are failing.B.C. Nature hopes municipalities in the province won\u2019t be deterred by a perception that there\u2019s a lack of progress towards the 30X30 goal and it wants them to measure, quantify and record their biodiverse, protected lands for the federal tally.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>British ColumbiaCities and towns across B.C. are trying to help the country meet an ambitious conservation goal of protecting 30 per cent of its lands and waters by 2030. While the square kilometres are adding up, Canada needs to double what\u2019s been done so far to meet its goal.Protected lands in cities and towns now [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12008,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[121,118,1],"tags":[120,116],"class_list":["post-12007","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-british-columbia","category-indigenous","category-uncategorized","tag-british-columbia","tag-indigenous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}