• Arctic SDI catalogue
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Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas

Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas (EBSAs) are areas within Canada's oceans that have been identified through formal scientific assessments as having special biological or ecological significance when compared with the surrounding marine ecosystem.

Failure to define an area as an EBSA does not mean that it is unimportant ecologically. All areas serve ecological functions to some extent and require sustainable management. Rather, areas identified as EBSAs should be viewed as the most important areas where, with existing knowledge, regulators and marine users should be particularly risk averse to ensure ecosystems remain healthy and productive.

Why are EBSAs identified?

EBSA information is used to inform marine planning, including environmental assessment and the siting of marine-based activities, by:

- Informing and guiding project-specific or regional environmental assessments;

- Informing and guiding industries and regulators in their planning and operations, for example: EBSAs have been acknowledged and referred to (often as "Special Areas" or "Potentially Sensitive Areas") in oil and gas related assessments;

- EBSA information has been provided to proponents of submarine cable projects to be used for route planning purposes;

- Informing and guiding Integrated Oceans Management (IOM) process within five Large Ocean Management Areas (LOMAs) and twelve marine bioregions;

- Serving as a basis for the identification of Areas of Interest (AOIs) and of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) (individually and in the context of planning bioregional networks of MPAs).

How are EBSAs identified?

The process used to identify EBSAs is generally comprised of two phases. The first phase involves compiling scientific data and knowledge of a marine area's ecosystems - notably fish species, marine mammals, sea birds, marine flora, marine productivity, physical and chemical conditions and geology. "Knowledge" includes experiential knowledge of long-time uses of the areas. In some cases (e.g., in the Arctic), substantial efforts are taken to collect traditional knowledge on ecosystems and environmental conditions from community members, fish harvests, hunters and individuals whose knowledge of the study area complement often helps fill scientific data gaps.

In the second phase, the available information for a marine area (e.g. a bioregion) is assessed against five nationally-established science-based criteria including:

- Uniqueness: How distinct is the ecosystem of an area compared to surrounding ones?

- Aggregation: Whether or not species populate or convene to the study area?

- Fitness consequence: How critical the area is to the life history of the species that use it (e.g. is it a spawning or feeding ground)?

- Naturalness: How pristine or disturbed by human activities is the study area?

- Resilience: What is the ability of the ecosystem to bounce back if it is disturbed?

Progress to date and next steps

EBSAs have been identified for large portions of Canada's Atlantic and Pacific Oceans as well as most of the Arctic oceans. EBSAs will continue to be identified in priority areas as resources become available to carry out the process. The boundaries or locations of existing EBSAs may be modified to reflect both new knowledge and changing environmental conditions.

Simple

Date ( RI_366 )
2007-01-01
Date ( RI_367 )
2016-03-21
Date ( RI_368 )
2021-08-13
RI_414
  Government of Canada; Fisheries and Oceans Canada; Ecosystems Science Directorate - Catherine Ste-Marie
200 Kent St. , Ottawa , Ontario , K1A 0E6 , Canada
RI_409
  Government of Canada; Fisheries and Oceans Canada
200 Kent St. , Ottawa , Ontario , K1A 0E6 , Canada
Status
onGoing; enContinue RI_596
Maintenance and update frequency
asNeeded; auBesoin RI_540
Keywords ( RI_525 )
  • Atlantic Ocean
  • Pacific Ocean
  • Canada
  • Arctic Ocean
  • EBSA
Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus Thésaurus des sujets de base du gouvernement du Canada ( RI_528 )
  • Oceans
  • Ecosystems
  • Biological diversity
  • Conservation
Classification
unclassified; nonClassifié RI_484
Use limitation
Open Government Licence - Canada (http://open.canada.ca/en/open-government-licence-canada)
Access constraints
license; licence RI_606
Use constraints
license; licence RI_606
Spatial representation type
vector; vecteur RI_635
Metadata language
eng; CAN; fra; CAN
Topic category
  • Boundaries
  • Biota
  • Geoscientific information
  • Oceans
  • Environment
Begin date
2007-01-01
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Reference system identifier
EPSG:3857
Distribution format
  • ESRI REST ( 10.7.1 )

  • SHP ( 10.7.1 )

RI_412
  Government of Canada; Fisheries and Oceans Canada
200 Kent St. , Ottawa , Ontario , K1A 0E6 , Canada
OnLine resource
Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas ( HTTPS )

Dataset;SHP;eng,fra

OnLine resource
data dictionary ( HTTPS )

Supporting Document;CSV;eng,fra

OnLine resource
Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas ( ESRI REST: Map Service )

Web Service;ESRI REST;eng

OnLine resource
Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas ( ESRI REST: Map Service )

Web Service;ESRI REST;fra

File identifier
d2d6057f-d7c4-45d9-9fd9-0a58370577e0 XML
Metadata language
eng; CAN
Character set
utf8; utf8 RI_458
Hierarchy level
dataset; jeuDonnées RI_622
Date stamp
2025-02-06T02:44:34.003Z
Metadata standard name
North American Profile of ISO 19115:2003 - Geographic information - Metadata
Metadata standard version
CAN/CGSB-171.100-2009
RI_414
  Government of Canada; Fisheries and Oceans Canada
200 Kent St. , Ottawa , Ontario , K1A 0E6 , Canada
 
 

Overviews

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Ecologically and Biologically Significant Areas

Spatial extent

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Keywords


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