Canada: Place a Moratorium on Off-Shore Drilling in the Gulf of St Lawrence
- by: Amelia Meister
- recipient: Prime Minister Trudeau
Currently, the Canadian government is considering allowing off-shore oil exploration and drilling in the Gulf of St Lawrence. The Gulf of St Lawrence is the most productive marine ecosystem in Canada and is used as home, breeding, spawning and nursing territory for over 2000 marine species including the endangered Blue whale, the right whale, the leatherback turtle and many bird and fish species.
The Fisheries Resource Conservation Council and the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans have both recommended a moratorium on drilling because there is not enough known about the intricate webs of life that exist in the Gulf. The oil companies say that they will mitigate risks but they cannot mitigate risks on what they don't know.
By signing today you are standing for healthy marine ecosystems in Canada.
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Off-shore oil drilling is a recipe for disaster. As we know from the BP Deep Horizon disaster, the is a huge potential for risk and ecosystem destruction. The Gulf of St Lawrence is home to thousands of species, like the krill, which supply nourishment to many other species and are key for the health of the Atlantic fisheries system.
However, the Gulf of St Lawrence is also the key to all the Atlantic provinces healthy economies. PEI, Newfoundland-Labradour, Nova Scotia New Brunswick and Quebec, as well as many First Nations, all rely on a healthy ecosystem for their tourism and fisheries industries to thrive. An oil spill would devastate all these communities.
By signing today you are helping to support strong, sustainable economies for the Atlantic provinces as well as the health of a vital marine ecosystem.
*Photo made available through Flickr feed of Louisiana GOHSEP and is licensed under the creative commons. Altered in size and addition of text from original image.
We demand an immediate moratorium on off-shore drilling in the Gulf of St Lawrence. We recognize that this is a complex and integral marine system that is home, breeding, spawning and nursing ground to thousands of marine animals including the endangered blue whale, the right whale and the leatherback turtle. We also acknowledge that is home to the largest concentration of krill, a foundational species, in the Northwest Atlantic.
We know that the risk of oil spills is high and that any oil spill would devastate the local, sustainable fisheries and tourism economies of the Atlantic provinces and First Nations. We do not think it is worth the risk.
We know that the Fisheries Resource Conservation Council and the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans have both recommended a moratorium based on the precautionary principle as the intricate relationships of this marine ecosystem remain largely unknown and therefore risk mitigation remains impossible.
We maintain that the continued development of the oil sector in Canada is not in alignment with the goals set out at COP21 and that continued reliance on oil is not in Canada's best interest, especially given the precarious nature of the current oil-based economy in the West.
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