Article by Meredith James and Dianne
Saxe
Sometimes, it feels like the 1990s again. In both Canada and the
US, budget shortfalls and political preferences are resulting in
significant cuts to environmental scientists and regulators. For
example, Environment Canada has announced that its current round of
cuts will eliminate approximately 300 jobs, affecting 776
positions. Such drastic cuts are always painful, and are bound to
affect the services that Environment Canada delivers.
Where will they cut? One important, but low-profile area of
Environment Canada's work is collection and analysis of
environmental data, an area that has struggled for funding for
years. Nature News reports that all 17 arctic ozone
monitoring stations could be shut down as early as this winter.
Closing the network is a significant loss to global arctic
monitoring and may jeopardize Canada's ability to meet its
obligation under the Montreal Protocol to monitor the ozone layer
and maintain
