Carney rolls out new $3.8 billion nature strategy, new conservation areas

By Canadian Press on March 31, 2026.

LA PÊCHE — The Liberal government has unveiled a $3.8 billion strategy to protect nature through measures like creating new national parks and marine conservation areas.

Prime Minister Mark Carney is making the announcement today just weeks after conservation groups warned that federal funding was running out.

Carney says his government is taking an “ambitious” approach to creating new conservation spaces and new urban parks which will require “significant funding.”

Carney is announcing the plan at an event in Wakefield, Que., this morning and released a list of planned new conservation areas.

Those include the Wiinipaawk Indigenous protected area and national marine conservation area in the Eastern James Bay and the Seal River watershed national park in Manitoba.

The federal government committed four years ago to protecting 30 per cent of the country’s land and waters by 2030, and Carney says these new areas will bring that target within reach.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 31, 2026.

— With files from Kyle Duggan

Nick Murray, The Canadian Press