Photo Credit: Trevor Hesselink
Thank you to everyone who joined us at the Ring of Fire, a threat to Climate Change event on May 16, 2023.
We had fun hosting the event and learning about the Ring of Fire from our guests, who helped shed a light to issues and shared their experiences with us.
You can watch a recording of the Webinar on our Youtube Channel here.
Background:
More than 1,000 kilometers north of Guelph lies a massive potential mining area known as the Ring of Fire. But at what cost?
Situated in the James and Hudson Bay lowlands, it stores five times more carbon per hectare than the Amazon rainforest. It also contains the second largest peatland and third largest wetland in the world. For thousands of years it has provided nourishment, culture, home and a livelihood to Indigenous communities. And over that same time, it has become one of the world’s largest climate change fighting stores of carbon.
This past summer, Evan Ferrari and three friends paddled 700 kilometers through this vast roadless wilderness. On their journey, they visited remote Indigenous communities and a diamond mine in a quest to learn more about the Ring of fire.
Anna Baggio, Conservation Director for Wildlands League works to protect this treasure in collaboration with scientists and indigenous communities who call this the breathing lands.
Watch as we travel through the Ring of Fire with Anna and Evan and discover the benefits of the Breathing Lands.
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Speakers
- Anna Baggio, Conservation Director for Wildlands League
For two decades Anna has worked with Indigenous leaders, governments, industry and communities to protect Canada’s ecosystems and to co-create solutions for people and the planet.
Anna is currently working on two Indigenous Protected Areas in northern Ontario (the North French Watershed with Moose Cree First Nation and in Fawn River Watershed with Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug. She’s also helping to safeguard the Hudson Bay Lowland, one of the world’s most important terrestrial carbon stores.
- Evan Ferrari, Executive Director eMERGE Guelph (a well seasoned tripper)
Paddling through the Ring of Fire on the Attawapiskat River was “epic” for Evan Ferrari.
He’s excited to share the joys of more than 100 sets of rapids, remarkable geography, wildlife and overwhelming volumes of insects that enjoyed his very being. But the best part of the trip was the welcome and generosity they received from two remote Indigenous communities that was humbling and transformative. When not dreaming about his next canoe trip, he fights climate change from his home in Guelph, at eMERGE.
