Toronto, January 29, 2010 – Due to an overwhelming outpouring of support from Canada’s major broadcasters, the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) is proud to announce that A Force for Nature will be aired across the country. This 30 second PSA, invites Canadians to join NCC in helping protect ecologically significant habitat and our native biodiversity.
Narrated by CBC on-air personality and celebrated author Stuart McLean A Force for Nature will appear thanks to NCC’s generous broadcast partners CTV, Global, Rogers, Canwest, BNN, Channel Zero, Corus, CHEX-TV, CITL/Newcap TV, Sun-TV and the Weather Network. NCC plans to continue the campaign throughout 2010.
2010 is the International Year of Biodiversity, and people all over the world are working to safeguard this irreplaceable natural wealth and reduce biodiversity loss. With A Force for Nature, NCC and its broadcast partners are offering Canadians an opportunity to participate in this global issue on a local level.
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“What we do is tangible; we like to say we produce results you can walk on. Its not only something that’s important today, its going to be there for our children, our grandchildren, and for generations to come,” says John Lounds, President & CEO, Nature Conservancy of Canada.
Facts
2010 has been declared the International Year of Biodiversity by the United Nations. Human activity is causing the diversity of life on Earth to be lost at greatly accelerated rates that are often irreversible.
13 species have already gone extinct in Canada – gone forever – and hundreds more are officially listed by the federal government under the Species at Risk Act (SARA).
Conserve Nature with Stuart McLean
Habitat loss is the greatest factor impacting global biodiversity. It is a main threat to 85 percent of all species classified as endangered or threatened in the IUCN Red List.
Across North America, populations of once common birds such as the Lark Sparrow, the Grasshopper Sparrow and the Loggerhead Shrike have dropped by more than 60 percent over the last four decades.
Close to 70 percent of the North American grasslands are gone; and there is less than one half of one percent of Manitoba’s Tall Grass Prairie left.
Only one herd of Mountain Caribou remains in the South Selkirk Mountains and it has less than 50 members. This is the only herd that travels south into the United States.
Last year, NCC protected more than 90 properties for a total of 174,351 acres.
Learn More
The Nature Conservancy of Canada is Canada’s leading land conservation organization. Since 1962 we have helped to protect more than 2 million acres of ecologically significant land nationwide. http://www.natureconservancy.ca