Tapping into a maple tree in Canada has been sweetened by a new designation as a nationally significant historic event.
Federal Environment Minister John Baird on Tuesday announced the official designation of maple products as “an event of national historical significance,” which gives the products an added profile through the national commemoration program.
“Maple products and the annual spring tapping of maple syrup is integral to the identity, not only of Lanark County, but of Canada as a whole,” said Ontario MP Scott Reid at the Wheeler’s Museum of McDonalds Corners, Ont., marking the designation at one of three events Tuesday.
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“There is nothing more Canadian than maple syrup and I am delighted to highlight the importance of maple products” to people in Quebec, MP Jacques Gourde said at a similar event at Mont-St-Hilaire, Que. “Today’s celebration recognizes the hard work of Canadians who have contributed to making the maple industry a Canadian icon.”
A third event was held Wednesday at the Usine Citadelle at Plessisville, also in Quebec.
Unlike most historic events, maple products will get three commemorative plaques, one at each of those three locations.
According to Michel Audy, executive secretary for the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada (HSMBC), the plaque at Mont-St-Hilaire, near a pre-existing permanent historic exhibit, will mark the pre-colonial use of maple products, while the McDonalds Corner plaque will be near the Wheeler family’s sugar bush and museum and the Plessisville plaque will be at the maple products cannery there.
Baird’s decision to grant the historic event designation comes on the recommendation of the HSMBC.
Parks Canada and the HSMBC are expected to work with local communities and stakeholders to plan placement for the plaques to highlight the importance of maple products in Canada, the government said Tuesday in a news release.
The national commemoration program is meant to support on-site and online opportunities to better understand and appreciate Canada’s unique history and culture. Another goal of the program is to create learning and tourism opportunities that support regional economic development.
Maple products benefit from increased public awareness and the federal government’s recognition as being of “national importance” to Canada, Audy said.
“To a degree,” the government wrote Tuesday, maple products represent, both at home and abroad, “the national identity and way of life of Canadians, and are a symbol of the end of the Canadian winter.”
Out of over 150 maple species worldwide, only a few of the 13 native North American species yield sap suitable for maple products. The six species in Canada with sap sweet enough to produce sugar and syrup can be found in eight provinces but only Quebec, Ontario, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia have enough sugar maples for a “real” maple industry, the government wrote.
Top producer
Maple products’ use in Canada date back well before the arrival of European colonists, who made the products a “valuable export resource” by the late 19th century, the government wrote. At that time, the U.S. was the world’s top supplier of maple products and remained so for decades, until Canada took over top spot in 1932.
A provincial government-backed co-operative, Les producteurs de sucre d’erable du Quebec, formed in the 1920s and was “a major factor in breaking the monopoly held by the American George C. Cary on maple products,” the government wrote.
Maple products will join oil and gas extraction at Leduc, Alta., whaling at Pond Inlet, Nunavut and and nickel mining at Sudbury, Ont., among Canada’s 391 historic events. Those also include the first long-distance telephone call in 1876 from Brantford, Ont., the depression-era “On-To-Ottawa Trek” from Regina and the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway at Port Moody, B.C.
Canada’s system of historic sites also includes 937 sites and 610 historic persons.
(CORRECTION, April 23: An earlier version of this article, which suggested that a decision had yet to be made on the siting of a commemorative plaque for maple products, was incorrect.)
