On Sept. 26, The Vancouver Sun reported that Canada ranks second only to Denmark as the world’s happiest country, and that Canadians are “satisfied or very satisfied” mainly because they enjoy relatively high levels of income and a publicly funded health care system.
Before cheering, we should also heed The Sun’s frequent warnings that Canadians jeopardize their future by saving too little, and by assuming too much debt, and that there’s compelling evidence consuming more does not necessarily make humans happier.
It’s past time to acknowledge that the individual and collective well-being of Homo sapiens —“happiness” if you wish — depends on economic, cultural, social and, yes, “spiritual” aspects hardwired to the health of the environment. Or to ecosystem services, to be more precise: the providing and filtering of water, regulating climate, protecting against floods, and so on.
A recent report puts the total economic benefits accruing from these three ecosystem services to Lower Mainlanders at an impressive $5.4 billion annually, or $6,368 per household.
But those figures don’t begin to capture the full value of our wild Pacific salmon. Maybe we don’t even need polls or experts to tell us that wild salmon have a diverse and immense value — or that things aren’t all that rosy with Fraser sockeye (or, for that matter, with the Pacific ecosystem itself).
We know deep down that our future well-being is inextricably linked to the full suite of benefits that comes to us from healthy populations of wild salmon.
Thanks to the Cohen Inquiry, we’ve gained a far better understanding of the plight of the still-revered Fraser sockeye.
A veritable army of experts produced mountains of depressing evidence that the once magnificent sockeye resource has been, and still is being, victimized by thermal stress, habitat loss, pollution, over-fishing, native and introduced pathogens, short-sightedness, conflicted government mandates, and a host of other indignities.
Those who study resource management will tell you the abuses heaped on sockeye are but one more example of a remarkably robust pattern of what they ominously call “resource management pathology.” In other words, our resource management policies and practices have harmed and are still harming the very resource they purportedly protect.
It’s another Canadian example, British Columbia’s own Atlantic cod story. The steep, two-decade decline in Fraser River sockeye means not just that there are fewer fish to catch, but that the intricately linked web of economic, cultural, social and “spiritual” services normally delivered by healthy populations of Fraser sockeye has been severely ravaged. We shouldn’t need to be told that our overall well-being and happiness have been affected by the loss of services provided by salmon.
So, can we turn the ship around — for both sockeye and our well-being? Answering this vital question hinges on the official findings of Justice Cohen — now promised by the end of October — and, more importantly, on how government responds to the $26 million inquiry it announced with fanfare almost three years ago.
There’s certainly no shortage of positive actions the federal government could and should take. It could start by putting the needs of the public’s wild salmon resource ahead of the wishes of the salmon farmers by transitioning the industry to closed-containment systems and controlling pathogen threats. It could toughen habitat protection laws and encourage rather than smother unbiased science.
But history, recent events and expert opinions suggest government response will be tepid. Government food inspection officials testifying at the Cohen Inquiry were more concerned about protecting trade than protecting wild sockeye.
One government scientist bravely testified she felt threatened and muzzled. And even before receiving Cohen’s final report and recommendations, the federal government shamelessly gutted the federal fisheries and environmental assessment acts.
Accordingly, the public has good reason to suspect its own federal government will undermine Canada’s long-term well-being by continuing to undervalue the nation’s ecosystems and the precious services they provide.
The ultimate legacy of the Cohen Inquiry may yet be an officially sanctioned unmasking of a long and vigorous ideology that ultimately leads to yet more homegrown loss.
Still, we should forgive those who endured the process and waded through the evidence (see Cohen Inquiry Highlights at www.watershed-watch.org), for clinging to the hope that Justice Cohen’s report may yet prompt positive change.
Maybe the report will help people understand that human well-being is less about GDP than about sustaining renewable resources, and that extracting and exploiting resources as quickly as possible, and being otherwise heedless of the full value of the Earth’s ecosystem services are surefire ways to reduce our individual and collective well-being — no matter what defenders of the status quo claim. With its still-rich-though-now-fragile resources, and with enlightened resource management, Canada could still legitimately become the planet’s happiest country.
Craig Orr is executive director and Pete Broomhall an editor and adviser to Watershed Watch Salmon Society, a participant in the Cohen Sockeye Inquiry.