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 Proactive disclosure Print version   | |  Archive of Latest News - 2004 This information represents activities in the Earth Sciences Sector Programs (2002-2006). Please refer to Priorities for information on current Earth Sciences Sector Programs.
Watersheds, Wildlife and People The Atlas of Canada and the Canadian Wildlife Federation (CWF) are partnering to produce a poster map of Canadian Watersheds. The poster map will be based on the national-scale watershed framework developed by ESS's Geomatics for Sustainable Development of Natural Resources (GSDNR) program. In April 2006, approximately 30,000 teachers will receive a Canadian Watershed map, in addition to the CWF teachers' kits, during 'National Wildlife Week' and 'National Oceans Day'. During these events students will be encouraged to create a wall mural reflecting their local watershed and to gather related pictures, water samples, and interviews. Students will be directed to on-line resources such as the Atlas Web Site and Environment Canada's ResEau project (where Atlas frameworks are also deployed). The CWF has advocated the protection of Canada's wild species and spaces since 1962. With over 300,000 members and supporters, the federation is one of Canada's largest not-for-profit, non-governmental conservation organizations. The ultimate goal of the CWF-Atlas partnership is to help youth appreciate the links between watershed health, wildlife habitat, and human activity.
2004-2005 Citation of Recognition for Natural Resources Canada, through the Centre for Topographic Information in Sherbrooke (CTIS), would like to acknowledge the performance of two Canadian companies in producing geospatial data. We thank Groupe Trifide Inc. (Quebec/Rimouski, Quebec) for producing vector data for the National Topographic Data Base (NTDB) at the 1: 50 000 scale and Groupe Info Consult (Sainte-Foy, Quebec) for the planimetric correction of NTDB data sets. These firms have demonstrated, throughout production year 2004-2005, their ability to produce digital data that surpass strict technical requirements. They also met deadlines as stipulated in the contracts and established strong communication links with CTIS technical representatives. The digital geospatial data thus produced contribute to the achievement of the objectives of the "Geomatics for Sustainable Development of Natural Resources" and "Geomatics for Northern Development" programs of the Earth Sciences Sector. Congratulations and thank you for a job well done! More information on the Earth Sciences Sector's Programs at Natural Resources Canada.
Marine protected areas : Baja California to Bering seaNew book and map identify 28 marine priority conservation areas In June 2005, the Commission for Environmental Co-operation (CEC), a trinational environmental organization established by Canada, the US and Mexico in parallel with the NAFTA agreement, held its annual Council meeting in Quebec City. The environment ministers from Canada, the United States and Mexico were in attendance. As part of their review of the CEC's past year's accomplishments, the following item was included and appears on the CEC website. "On the eve of World Oceans Day (June 8, 2005), the Commission for Environmental Co-operation (CEC) and Marine Biology Conservation Institute (MCBI) launched a new book and map that identify 28 aquatic environments that marine experts consider essential to safeguarding the biological diversity of the west coast of North America.". http://www.cec.org/home/index.cfm?varlan=english The "map" referred to above and available on-line is based upon a digital North American base map integrated through a partnership between the Atlas programs in Canada (NRCan), the United States (USGS), and Mexico (INEGI). Bilateral MOUs have been signed between the Atlas programs to continue this framework integration work at more detailed scales. Discussions are on-going with the International Joint Commission (IJC), an independent binational organization established in 1909 to prevent and resolve disputes relating to the use and quality of Canada/US boundary waters. The IJC is interested in obtaining harmonized Canada/US base maps for depicting transboundary watersheds for planning purposes and stakeholder discussions. It is worth mentioning that the Atlas Frameworks for North America (scale 1:10 M) and Canada (scale 1:1 M) created by the Geomatics for the Sustainable Development of Natural Resources (GSDNR) program are available at http://geogratis.cgdi.gc.ca under "National Scale Frameworks". Contact: Peter Paul
Drainage Basins Base Map for Environment Canada Report Drainage Basins Base Map for Environment Canada Report
GSDNR Showcase Event Meeting of the National Hydro Network (NHN) with the National Land and Water Information Service (NLWIS) In February the NHN project team held a meeting with AAFC's NLWIS management team which included the technical representatives of the various regional AAFC programs. The discussions were very fruitful and confirmed NLWIS's need for the NHN data. The head of the "water" component of the NLWIS "data plan" was given the responsibility of defining the links between the two projects and establishing a role for the NHN in the overall NLWIS implementation plan. Another meeting is planned for late March in Regina to study the possibility of carrying out a pilot project in Saskatchewan involving the various federal and provincial partners. Yukon Government to collaborate in the creation of the National Hydro Network (NHN) The NHN project team was in Whitehorse in February to discuss establishing the NHN for the Yukon. Following a day of intense dialogue and discussion, the two parties agreed to collaborate by sharing the cost of contract work to create the NHN throughout the territory. Change detection and sector update phases will precede the creation of the NHN, which is anticipated to take up to three-years to complete. Nunavut road network update on GeoBase The road network for twenty-six (26) Nunavut communities are now available for download from GeoBase. Recognition and thanks to the Ministry of Economic Development and Transportation of Nunavut who's data contributions to the NRN project have allowed NRCan to extract and compile the base centerline data. The Nunavut road network is now comprised of 812 kilometres of closest to the source data. This new dataset contains roads data for the following communities:
Inclusion of remote and isolated local network additions like those of Nunavut territory marks another new milestone in the ongoing improvements of the National Road Network (NRN).
Letter of Agreement signed between GSDNR & North America Commission for Environmental Co-operation (CEC) In January 2005 the GSDNR program and the North American Commission for Environmental Co-operation (CEC) signed a Letter of Agreement to partner in the production of a new map depicting existing and proposed Marine Protected Areas along the Pacific Coast of North America. The map is based on North American framework data developed last year in a partnership involving the CEC and the Atlas programs in Canada, the US and Mexico. Approximately 5,000 copies of the map will be printed for inclusion in an upcoming CEC publication on its 'Baja to Bering' Marine Protected Areas program. Pilot sites have been identified by each country as focal points for work now underway to develop a set of shared performance indicators (socio-economic and biophysical) and monitoring protocols. GeoNames Application and Federal-Provincial Cooperation Most maps include names as text features, but there is growing interest in linking the names of places and physical features directly to their associated geometry. In this way our most intuitive co-ordinate system (names) can enable powerful database searches in the digital map world. The GSDNR program is providing support to geographical names linkages at both the Atlas (1:1M) and GeoBase (1:50K) scales in partnership with the provinces. Recently, the Atlas frameworks group made a presentation on their Concise Gazetteer Atlas project to the Newfoundland and Labrador Names Board. Agreement was reached to co-operate on both the delineation and quality control of geographical names as well as the distribution of these delineation maps nationally during the centenary of the Atlas of Canada (2006). Additional innovations feature the incorporation of names pronunciations and special syllabic characters for northern names. Archived News
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