It is important to address…

It is important to address the housing crisis; however, building housing at the cost of important natural areas will permanently cause drastic declines in our province's biodiversity affecting the people of this province's finances and wellbeing.

While it is difficult to see how the destruction of one habitat can affect everyday Ontarian, loss of biodiversity can directly affect us through damaging agricultural production, and the spread of disease. As we have seen in recent years, the evolution of new infectious diseases can have drastic effect on our everyday lives. Globally, over 18% of disease emergence events were directly due to the habitats of host species being modified by things such has urban development (4). A loss of biodiversity can also cause overall changes in ecological systems resulting in an increase in pests directly affecting agriculture which is so important to our provinces well being (5). An increase of pests, or invasive species caused by a loss of native biodiversity will cost our province millions of dollars if we do not act now.

Southwestern Ontario is one of the most important hotspots for biodiversity in Canada. Globally biodiversity has been rapidly declining in the last 100 years due to human destruction of habitats (1). The creation of housing has been shown to directly cause declines in over the creation of housing has been shown to directly cause declines in over 30% of threatened assessed species globally (2). Similarly, in invertebrate species over 10% of declines are directly attributed to urbanization, with deforestation, and wetland alteration accounting for another 14% of declines (3). To destroy the greenbelt in the pursuit of housing would be an irreversible mistake. The protection of other lands in Ontario will not make up for the habitat lost in the greenbelt. The habitats found in the GTA are unique to this region and the species which reside in cannot simply move to habitats across the province.

I strongly oppose any changes to the greenbelt as they currently stand and suggest our government looks into other options to assist with housing. Increases in high density housing which is currently prevented by zoning laws in the city of Toronto could be one option. As a province we cannot make short sighted decisions to deal with todays problems while causing strife for future generations.

1. Johnson, C., Balmford, A., Brook, B., Buettel, J., Galetti, M., Guangchun, L., and Wilmshurst, J., (2017) Biodiversity losses and conservation responses in the Anthropocene, Science, 356 (6335) 270-275
2. Maxwell, S., Fuller, R., Brooks, T., and Watson, J., (2016) Biodiversity: The ravages of guns, nets and bulldozers, nature, 536, 143-145.
3. Sánchez-Bayo, F, and Wyckhuys,K. (2009) Worldwide decline of the entomofauna: A review of its drivers, Biological Conservation, 232, 8 - 27
4. Keesing, F., Belden, L., Daszak, P. et al. (2010) Impacts of biodiversity on the emergence and transmission of infectious diseases. Nature 468, 647–652 (2010). https://doi-org.subzero.lib.uoguelph.ca/10.1038/nature09575
5. Chapin III, F., Zavaleta, E., Eviner, V. et al. (2000) Consequences of changing biodiversity. Nature 405, 234–242. https://doi-org.subzero.lib.uoguelph.ca/10.1038/35012241