Canada’s Arctic Foreign Policy - Budget proposal, December 2024

Public Statement for the Strategic Environmental and Economic Assessment (SEEA) Cabinet Directive 

The Arctic Foreign Policy (AFP) seeks to ensure that GAC is fit-for-purpose in the Arctic by providing new diplomatic tools that strengthen Canada’s Arctic diplomacy. It also supports a more inclusive approach to Arctic diplomacy that is informed by Arctic and northern Indigenous Peoples and other northerners knowledge.  The AFP is based on 4 pillars: 

• Asserting Canada’s sovereignty 

• Advancing Canada’s interests through pragmatic diplomacy 

• Leadership on Arctic governance and multilateral challenges 

• Adopting a more inclusive approach to Arctic diplomacy 

This proposal has undergone an analysis using the CNEL Reference Template. The CNEL Reference Template was filled and signed by accountable entities within GAC. Hence, GAC Ministers’ accountabilities and responsibilities for the 2024 SEA Cabinet Directive have been fulfilled. 

The AFP takes a two-track approach to address climate and environmental issues, with engagement at the multilateral level through the UN system, and at the regional level through the Arctic Council. It commits to working with international partners to boost global efforts to achieve the Paris Agreement goal of limiting warming to 1.5°C and avoid the most devastating impacts for the world, including in the Arctic. Among other objectives, Canada is on track to do its part in contributing to Arctic states’ collective goal of reducing emissions of black carbon by 25-33% of 2013 levels by 2025. Significantly reducing short-lived climate pollutant emissions will lead to near-term climate benefits for the Arctic.  

Under the AFP, Canada is also addressing biodiversity loss domestically and globally. We continue to work towards conserving 30% of our lands and oceans by 2030. A large part of Canada’s protected and conserved areas fall within Canada’s Arctic and North and many are being co-managed with Indigenous Peoples. 

To increase cohesiveness, the AFP commits GAC to continuing to leverage our diplomatic resources in support of all government efforts led by Environment and Climate Change Canada in the UN system to ensure implementation of the historic 2015 Paris Agreement and the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework.  

The AFP also commits to continued advocacy of international partners to join Canadian-led initiatives on phasing out coal, reducing short-lived climate pollutants, finalizing a global treaty to end plastic pollution, protecting more of nature, and other related initiatives. It also commits to promote any other diplomatic initiative that address climate change. 

Additionally, in the context of the Arctic Council’s initiatives on climate change, Canada will continue our ongoing work at a regional level to develop scientific assessments on the impacts of climate change and the state of biodiversity in the Arctic, to reduce short-lived climate pollutants in the Arctic region, to encourage the use and development of renewable energy in remote Arctic communities, to exchange knowledge and implement solutions on wildfires and climate change adaptation in an Arctic context, to develop a pan-Arctic network of marine protected areas, to develop a pan-Arctic network of marine protected areas, and to implement the regional action plan on marine litter in the Arctic. 

Elsewhere, Canada will encourage all allies to join Canada’s new NATO Climate Change and Security Centre of Excellence (CCASCOE) based in Montréal and leverage CCASCOE’s expertise to promote research and knowledge sharing on climate security threats in the Arctic.