Photo Credit: Wanuskewin, SK
World Heritage Sites represent some of humanity’s most impressive achievements and nature’s most inspiring creations. They are exceptional places that are considered to have Outstanding Universal Value – these sites are as diverse as the Pyramids of Egypt and Australia’s Great Barrier Reef – and they reflect the best of cultural and natural heritage.
As part of Canada 150, and for the first time ever, Canadians from coast-to-coast-to-coast were invited to nominate Canada’s most exceptional places to be future candidates for UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
On December 20, 2017, in celebration of the 150th anniversary of Confederation, the Minister of Environment and Climate Change and Minister responsible for Parks Canada, Catherine McKenna, announced the addition of eight new places to Canada’s list of candidate sites for UNESCO World Heritage recognition. Today’s announcement is the first update to Canada’s Tentative List for World Heritage Sites since 2004.
Inscription of a site on the World Heritage List is the highest possible recognition of heritage value internationally. The benefits of World Heritage inscription will be unique to each site and may increase international recognition and tourism, lead to new partnerships in the management of the site, and promote pride in representing and safeguarding one of the world’s most precious places.
Tentative List:
- Hecate Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound Glass Sponge Reefs, British Columbia: Thought to be extinct some 40 million years ago, Sponge Reefs were discovered in 1987 off the coast of British Columbia. The reefs provide a unique window into marine life in the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods and their intricate structure provides shelter to numerous species.
- Stein Valley, British Columbia: Depicting and preserving a wealth of Nlaka’pamux , the Stein Valley showcases a living cultural tradition representative of Indigenous land-use in the western North American plateau.
- Wanuskewin, Saskatchewan: Considered a sacred site and gathering place, Wanuskewin archaeological remains provide a complete record of human settlement and cultural tradition as a gathering place from 6,400 years ago to today.
- Anticosti Island, Quebec: Located in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Anticosti Island showcases am outstanding record of fossil life anywhere in the world through the upper Ordovician and lower Silurian time interval. It was formed by the accumulation of sedimentary deposits laden with invertebrates, between 435 and 447 million years ago. This time period represents a milestone event in the history of the Earth, the first global mass extinction of animal life.
- Heart’s Content Cable Station Provincial Historic Site, Newfoundland and Labrador: Monument to the world’s first successful trans-oceanic submarine telegraph cable in 1866.
- Qajartalik, Nunavut: The Qajartalik petroglyph site is a unique archaeological site in the Canadian Arctic, providing a tangible link to the cultural tradition of the Dorset people. Qajartalik’s petroglyphs, which depict almost 180 stylized faces, are an impressive example of the creative genius of the Dorset people, who lived along the coasts of Nunavik from 2,200 to 1,000 years ago and disappeared before the arrival of the Thule Inuit approximately 800 years ago.
- Sirmilik National Park and the proposed Tallurutiup Imanga National Marine Conservation Area, Nunavut: Representative of Inuit culture and Inuit interaction with the Arctic environment as it becomes vulnerable under the impact of climate change.
- Yukon Ice Patches, Yukon
More to Know
- There are 18 World Heritage Sites in Canada, including the Rideau Canal National Historic Site.
- L’Anse aux Meadows National Historic Site
- Nahanni National Park Reserve
- Dinosaur Provincial Park
- Kluane / Wrangell-St.Elias / Glacier Bay / Tatshenshini-Alsek
- Head-Smashed-In Buffalo Jump
- SGang Gwaay
- Wood Buffalo National Park
- Canadian Rocky Mountain Parks
- Historic District of Old Québec
- Gros Morne National Park
- Old Town Lunenburg
- Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park
- Miguasha National Park
- Rideau Canal
- Joggins Fossil Cliffs
- Landscape of Grand Pré
- Red Bay Basque Whaling Station
- Mistaken Point
- Canada’s Tentative List for World Heritage Sites was last updated in 2004.
- Parks Canada is the Government of Canada’s representative for the UNESCO World Heritage Convention.
- Parks Canada received 42 applications from Canadians for sites to be placed on Canada’s Tentative List for World Heritage. The full list of the 42 sites proposed for Canada’s Tentative List can be found on Parks Canada’s website.
- A Ministerial Advisory Committee, composed of seven Canadian experts in natural and cultural heritage, conservation and commemoration, reviewed all applications based on the extent to which they met World Heritage standards and recommended the sites to the Minister for addition to Canada’s Tentative List.
- The most recently inscribed World Heritage site in Canada is Mistaken Point, Newfoundland and Labrador, which was added to the World Heritage List in July 2016.
Six sites remain on the Tentative List from the previous update in 2004:
o Áísínai’pi (Writing-On-Stone), Alberta
o Pimachiowin Aki, Manitoba and Ontario
o Gwaii Haanas, British Columbia
o Ivvavik/Vuntut/Herschel Island (Qikiqtaruk), Yukon
o Tr’ondëk Klondike, Yukon
o Quttinirpaaq, Nunavut
For more information; See Parks Canada