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Framework for Developing Standardized Monitoring Protocols and Evaluating Success for Habitat Offsets, Banks, and Restoration Projects

National Peer Review - National Capital Region

March 17-21, 2025

Virtual

Chairperson: Keith Clarke

Context

Fisheries and Oceans Canada’s (DFO) Fish and Fish Habitat Protection Program (FFHPP) requires standardized monitoring protocols to determine if habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects are successful in terms of meeting their planned objectives. Past Canadian Science Advisory Secretariat (CSAS) science advice on habitat offset monitoring produced guidelines and criteria for different levels of monitoring intensity (DFO 2012, Smokorowski et al. 2015, Braun et al. 2019, DFO 2019); however they did not produce a framework or protocols for operationalizing standardized monitoring in different situations. Reviews of existing data and publications from habitat projects that required monitoring revealed that many had inconsistencies or issues in study design, data collection, metrics, data accessibility, and data quality control which make it difficult to determine whether the intended outcome of these projects was achieved. Further, these same inconsistencies resulted in the inability to use monitoring results for subsequent meta-analyses. Collectively, this represents a significant lost opportunity to use data from required monitoring to evaluate the success/effectiveness of the habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects across Canada, which could advance our knowledge and improve outcomes for habitat projects and reporting on program results.

To date, DFO FFHPP does not have standardized monitoring requirements and methods for collecting chemical, physical, and biological data for habitat offsetting, banks, and restoration projects. As a result, in 2021, DFO FFHPP Ontario and Prairie Region requested DFO Science to review three contracted proposed standardized monitoring approaches and associated data collection techniques for habitat offsets including lake construction, channel construction, and aquatic habitat works. The resulting regional CSAS peer-review process in November 2022 provided a summary of high-level concerns associated with the contractor reports and proposed recommendations on how to address those concerns. Additionally, it provided science advice on key steps needed to develop an operational standardized monitoring system that could be applied for different habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects across Canada (DFO 2024). The key steps recommended in the November 2022 CSAS process (DFO 2024) were to:

  1. develop one overarching framework including an evaluation strategy and associated templates to guide the development of standardized monitoring protocols for habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects;
  2. use the framework and templates to develop specific monitoring protocols for the different ecotypes, ecoregions, and project types across Canada; and
  3. develop an operational evaluation system to determine whether projects were successful in meeting their intended objectives.

Based on the recommendations in DFO (2024), DFO FFHPP Ontario and Prairie Region subsequently requested DFO Science to address recommendation 1 above. Specifically, the request is for science advice for habitat offsets, banks, and restorations projects, that has a national scope, and provides direction for the continued development of science based standardized monitoring protocols, and provides a strategy to develop a system for evaluating the success of a habitat project in terms of meeting its planned objectives (e.g., target habitat areas, target fish productivity or diversity). A framework, monitoring protocol templates, and evaluation strategy are foundational pieces required to develop a scientifically-defensible operational standardized monitoring system (includes recommendations 1, 2, and 3 above). A standardized monitoring system for habitat projects across Canada is invaluable for determining their effectiveness and helps achieve DFO FFHPP’s broader goal of conservation, protection, and restoration of fish and fish habitat.

Objectives

This national science peer-review aims to produce a framework for developing standardized protocols for monitoring and evaluating success for habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects across Canada. Specifically, it will include:

  1. A framework for the development of standardized monitoring protocols for habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects that aligns with past CSAS advice;
  2. Associated monitoring protocol templates to be used with the framework to guide the future development of specific standardized monitoring protocols that could be applied to habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects; and,
  3. An evaluation strategy to determine the success of habitat offsets, banks, and restoration projects in terms of meeting their planned objectives.

The objective of this national CSAS peer-review meeting is to assess the quality and completeness of information presented in the proposed framework so that it aligns with previous DFO CSAS Science Advice and identify any missing information, uncertainties, and knowledge gaps, and if necessary, provide recommendations.

Expected Publications

Expected Participation

References

Notice

Participation to CSAS peer review meetings is by invitation only.

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