Canada cuts wildlife protection budget
The Canadian government has reportedly decided to slash its expenses on wildlife protection and monitoring of ecosystems because of a financial crunch. It has decided to cut the budget for its various environmental programmes by 80 per cent and that for climate change by 40 per cent.
The cuts mean the Canadian Wildlife Service, responsible for studying and protecting wildlife, will be forced to halt all its scientific work. The cuts will be in place until the current fiscal, which ends in early 2008. Until now, the government has not issued any official statement in this regard. Critics accuse the Canadian government of ignoring issues related to environment and climate change. Prime Minister Stephen Harper says Canada cannot meet targets to cut greenhouse-gas emissions under the Kyoto Protocol.