QUEBEC — While the sustainability of agricultural land is at risk, offenders continue to bury waste, backfill with contaminated material or cut down maple trees with complete impunity.
The Commissioner for Sustainable Development, Janique Lambert, presented her annual report on Thursday, which focuses mainly on agricultural practices and land protection.
She says she notes that the Commission for the Protection of Agricultural Territory of Quebec (CPTAQ) carries out “insufficient, ineffective” surveillance of the agricultural zone — this surveillance is based almost exclusively on the denunciations it receives.
Thus, it “does not allow the CPTAQ to identify offenses that are not reported to it”. It is also “dependent on the capacity of citizens and municipalities to detect offenses”, underlines Ms. Lambert in her report.
However, certain offenses lead to “disastrous” consequences for agricultural land, warns the commissioner, citing recent examples.
“In Mirabel, thousands of tons of waste were buried under agricultural land, while an old sand pit in Sainte-Marie-Salomé was illegally backfilled with potentially contaminated material,” she illustrates.
Furthermore, “denunciations rarely make it possible to limit damage to agricultural land since they concern offenses which have taken place, sometimes for a long time, and which may have damaged the resource”.
For example: a 1.5 hectare cut had already been carried out in a maple grove at the time the complaint was received. It takes on average 40 years for a sugar maple to produce maple syrup, notes the commissioner.
The orders issued by the CPTAQ are “not very dissuasive since they are not accompanied by any coercive means”; only a contempt of court judgment rendered by the Superior Court at the end of a process can give rise to possible sanctions.
However, between April 1, 2018 and March 31, 2023, the CPTAQ did not transmit any files to the Attorney General, and consequently did not use the criminal sanction mechanism provided for by law.
However, during this period, she had noted 116 violations concerning the removal of topsoil or the cutting of maple trees.
“These could potentially have been subject to fines. It is distressing to note that this situation is similar to that noted by the Auditor General in 1994,” says the commissioner.
Furthermore, Ms. Lambert deplores in her report the delays in processing denunciations: around 21% of denunciations received for more than five years are still in progress. Nearly 90 investigation files have been ongoing for more than ten years.
According to her, “such processing delays weaken the credibility of the CPTAQ in its supervisory role.”
“While it has the power, the CPTAQ has not recommended to the minister any improvements that would make its surveillance of the agricultural zone more effective, for example changes to the sanction mechanisms,” she notes.
Agricultural land at risk
This is because agricultural land is a limited and non-renewable resource essential to the food autonomy of populations, recalls the commissioner. Issues, such as the loss of cultivated areas, threaten its sustainability.
However, although the Quebec Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAPAQ) has been aware of these issues for “several years”, its interventions to ensure the protection of the territory remain “insufficient”.
Residences, road and energy infrastructure, commercial and industrial zones increasingly occupy Quebec’s agricultural territory, so much so that only a third of the land is currently under cultivation.
This situation has led to a staggering increase in the value of land (+84% from 2012 to 2022).
“What the commissioner underlines is completely aligned with the echoes we have had from the field for many years,” reacted in a press release Carole-Anne Lapierre, analyst in agriculture and food systems and agronomist at Équiterre.
“Our agricultural territory is crumbling and our food autonomy is threatened. The government has everything in hand to give the push we need to change things,” she added.
The commissioner also states in another chapter that she is concerned about the deterioration of the quality of soils, which risk being less resilient in the face of climate change.
She points in particular to “intensive tillage”, “insufficient rotations” and the “significant weight of machinery”, and asks MAPAQ to better support farmers so that they adopt sustainable agricultural practices.
Gaps in the management of the “Green Fund”
Furthermore, Ms. Lambert asks the Ministry of the Environment to “continue its efforts” to improve its management of the Electrification and Climate Change Fund (FECC), commonly known as the Green Fund.
She notes that “considerable” sums are collected in the FECC to finance actions aimed at combating climate change. However, the ministry does not evaluate the greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction performance for 40% of projects.
The Ministry of the Environment had committed to having indicators for 90% of its projects from September 2023. However, to date, only 60% of projects have a GHG reduction indicator.
“For nearly $3 billion, there is still a lack of effect indicators and targets to be able to say: (…) “Did it have the expected effects”,” Janique underlined at a press conference. Lambert.
“These are public funds, hence the need to ensure that each action chosen, (…) will provide the best results, because ultimately, it is to achieve the GHG reduction of 37, 5% for 2030,” she added.
