Top 10 2014 Stories: 3) The World is Watching

January 6, 2014

Net forest loss around the world
Credit: Department of Geographical Sciences, University of Maryland

Canada's boreal forest—long ignored despite being one of the last large, intact forests left on earth—has steadily become better known across the globe. In 2013, a number of published reports and events about Canada's boreal received unprecedented media coverage and demonstrated that the world will be watching in 2014 to see how Canada responds to the challenges of maintaining this immense and important forest. These publications and events include:

A Ducks Unlimited-Boreal Songbird Initiative report: 10 'Cool' Canadian Biodiversity Hotspots;

The International Boreal Conservation Science Panel report: Conserving the World's Last Great Forest is Possible: Here's How;

The lead symposium at this year's International Congress for Conservation Biology conference in Baltimore, attended by hundreds of scientist from around the world, addressed the role of First Nations in conserving Canada's boreal (as well as comparisons/shared ideas with Aboriginal land management leadership in Australia).

A new, interactive global map released in November that utilizes Google Earth showed the state of the world's great forest regions and is helping draw attention to Canada's boreal—both the successes in conserving the forest and the areas of loss.