UNB Woodlot development is shameful

July 20, 2008, 4:05 pm
Filed under: Species, UNB, Wetlands

July 17th, 2008

As a UNB alumnus, I’m embarrassed.

In a time of environmental crisis and despite being a public institute in a province whose public believes environmental concerns trump economic ones, UNB’s board of governors has approved a plan to parcel off 50 per cent (over 1,500 acres) of the UNB woodlot.

This is so that an ecosystem which includes numerous wetlands and is home to threatened species, such as the blue heron, can be developed over the coming years.

For an institute of higher learning, one would think this would be shameful enough; however, upon further inspection of these plans, something even more insidious is revealed.

By disclosing development plans in a piecemeal fashion (so far for about 270 acres), UNB can take advantage of a government loophole and evade a comprehensive environmental impact assessment.

Such an assessment would be risky as it would likely reveal what any biologist can attest – an ecosystem’s individual elements are interdependent and cannot be understood or evaluated separately. If you destroy part of such a system, you run the risk of compromising it all.

So subjected to only limited environmental impact assessments, UNB, like a landlord who slaps a coat of paint over rotting wood, can effectively – at least in the short term – conceal any evidence there may be of a collapsing ecosystem.

Ironically, an institute which assesses thousands of people every year seemingly believes itself above assessment. It’s time for UNB’s administrators to conduct themselves in a manner that truly reflects UNB’s mission statement, code of conduct and slogan.

By hawking off the woodlot for non-sustainable, 1970s style development, without any regard for the health of an entire ecosystem, they are active participants in exactly what researchers in their own institute, and indeed universities across the world, are working so hard to put an end to.

Carla Gunn

Fredericton

UNB Woodlot Watch

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