Powerful Reports By Environmental Commissioners

Congratulations to both the federal and provincial environmental commissioners, who continue to strenuously remind our governments how far they fall short on environmental stewardship, and who both issued powerful reports this week. Bees, Algonquin Park, "Chemical Alley", urban sprawl, climate change, weak environmental assessment, inadequate commitment to environmental monitoring in the oil sands: there is no shortage of environmental crises that require urgent responses.

Ontario: Bees and Neonicotinoids

Ontario Environmental Commissioner Gord Miller says the Ontario government "needs to take swift action and commit dedicated resources in order to avert a potential ecological and economic crisis" from the precipitous decline of pollinators such as bees. "There is now abundant evidence linking bee kills to neonicotinoid contaminated dust generated during the planting of seed-treated crops... If [federal] measures prove to be insufficient, restrictions on seed