Introduction

At the January 2003 meeting, the Advisory Committee on Rural Issues was asked to recommend a set of principles to be used in applying the Rural Lens to future policy and program considerations that flow from the Kyoto Accord and the development of an implementation plan for Canada.

Part A below sets out the principles formulated by the Committee in brief. Part B elaborates on Part A.

Part A

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• identify and differentiate the implications/consequences for rural and urban Canada.
  
• recognize rural diversity (metro-adjacent, heartland, and remote)

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• evaluate the rural implications of both climate change and the new policy/program actions.
  
• ensure that new programs/policies are evaluated against their long‑term local impacts on rural people and communities.
  
• evaluate barriers, conflicts, and opportunities within existing policy/program frameworks.

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• limit the costs borne solely by rural regions.
  
• recognize apportioned burden relative to rural and urban benefits.

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• include consideration of ability and capacity to pay.
  
• permit substitute contributions to Kyoto responsibilities.
  
• reinforce the federal government's equalization role.

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• not accelerate urban concentration.
  
• enhance opportunities for capital investment and retention in rural Canada, and access to capital by rural Canadians.
  
• create opportunities for public and private investment in rural Canada.
  
• include investments to create opportunities for rural Canadians.
  
• direct benefits to disadvantaged parts of rural Canada.

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• evaluate sustainability under a climate change regime.
  
• not limit future options.
  
• improve multi‑functionality.

Effective Kyoto policies for rural Canada will:

• promote rural choice.
  
• recognize and fund multi-functionality.
  
• balance choice against national interests.

Part B

Rural Canada is a diverse and complex arrangement of places and attributes. Federal policies and programs associated with the Kyoto Accord must avoid the one‑size‑fits‑all approach in two regards.

• In the first instance, policies and programs must identify and differentiate the implications/consequences for rural Canadians relative to those in urban/metropolitan areas.
  
  

• In the second instance, policies and programs must recognize diversity through at least three geographic types of rural locales (metro‑adjacent, heartland, and remote).

Rural Canada is subject to a complicated array of federal, provincial, territorial, First Nations, and local government policies, statutes, agreements, bylaws, programs, and regulations. With respect to federal actions, many policies and programs are sectoral and have been developed both in isolation and over long periods of time. The implications are that conflicting aspects of both new and/or old policies may limit their effectiveness, and that new policies developed for one Canadian context may be ill-suited to another. In addition, there is a need to evaluate and understand the effects to rural communities and rural peoples of any structural change that may result from taking specific measures to meet Kyoto commitments. For example, policies to convert agricultural land to forests to gain carbon credits may have a significant local effect on individuals (how they earn a living) and communities (creating major challenges and opportunities).

• Issues deriving from Kyoto require that the collective implications on rural places of both climate change and new policy/program actions be at the fore of consideration.
  
  

• Specifically, there is a need to ensure that any new programs or policies are understood and evaluated in terms of the nature and magnitude of their long-term local impacts on rural peoples and communities.
  
  

• In addition, new policy/program actions must be evaluated against existing policy/program frameworks relevant to the different geographic types of rural Canada so as to identify barriers, conflicts, and opportunities.

There will be some very real costs which flow from Kyoto. In the development of new policy/program actions it is imperative that Canadians share appropriate responsibility for these costs. Apportioned burden is built upon recognition of the inter-linked nature of rural and urban economies and that individuals/regions need to bear the costs they impose within that system. For example, while oil and gas production occurs largely in rural and remote locations, the economic and use benefits of those resources are largely consumed in urban locations. Thus, the costs of new policy/program actions with respect to oil and gas production and use must be shared.

• New policy/program actions must recognize that rural regions should not bear more than their fair share of Kyoto Accord costs.
  
  

• The introduction of new policy/program actions must recognize apportioned burden relative to rural and urban benefits derived from either past resource development policies or forthcoming actions.

While the costs of various Kyoto measures should be shared, not all rural regions will have the same ability or capacity to pay. This may be the result of long‑term dependency where resource profits left rural regions and accrued elsewhere. It may also be the result of some regions having more of a valued commodity (i.e. land) relative to other regions. Building upon the concept of progressive taxation, those regions with the economic resources to bear costs should be able to contribute accordingly while other regions should be able to substitute other forms of contribution.

• In the development of new policy/program actions, consideration should be given to the joint issues of ability and capacity to pay.
  
  

• Rural Canada should have options within policy/program actions to substitute contributions to Kyoto responsibilities.
  
  

• The introduction of new policy/program actions should reinforce the federal government's role in regional and urban/rural equalization.

Rural Canada has been greatly affected by the changes associated with globalization and economic restructuring. In some instances these changes have created new opportunities and advantages, while in others there have been costs and closures. In rural regions it is not unusual to find a mix of both new opportunities and costs. All of this is occurring alongside a longer term concentration and centralization of economic activity, investment, and population into urban centres. The introduction of new policy/program actions associated with Kyoto should wherever possible encourage the creation of new economic/investment opportunities which may both replace costs and counter concentration pressures.

• New policy/program actions should not accelerate urban concentration.
  
  

• The introduction of new policy/program actions should include opportunities for public and private investment in rural Canada.
  
  

• Similarly, attention must be paid to capital investment and retention in rural Canada, and to the access to capital by rural Canadians.
  
  

• The introduction of new policy/program actions should include investments which will create opportunities for rural Canadian participation.
  
  

• Benefits derived from new policy/program actions should be directed to disadvantaged parts of rural Canada to create foundations for opportunity.

Issues arising from Kyoto may bring into conflict different economic, environmental, social, and cultural values and considerations. There may also be a temptation to play these topics off against one another. From a long‑term perspective, and from a place‑based policy perspective, rural community development is about strengthening each of these areas to provide for a resilient, robust, healthy, and flexible rural Canada.

• As a consequence, new policy/program actions must be evaluated against whether they are sustainable under a climate change regime.
  
  

• Deriving from one of the foundations of sustainability, new policy/program actions must not limit future options for rural places or rural Canadians.
  
  

• To enhance opportunities for economic, environmental, social, and cultural engagement, new policy/program actions must improve, or at a minimum not limit, multi-functionality.

In part, each of the preceding principles includes the notion that rural Canada must be able to exercise a measure of choice in the policies, programs, and investments needed to address the implications flowing from the Kyoto Accord. This question of choice also adds several opportunities for new policy/program actions.

• As part of the recognition of diversity across rural Canada, the issue of choice for rural communities and Canadians should be built into new policies/programs.
  
  
• New policy/program actions should play a role in helping urban Canada recognize the national benefits of multi-functionality and finding funding formulas to pay for it.
  
  
• The exercise of choice by rural Canada in response to new policy/program actions will need to be balanced against national interests.