In the Central Interior of BC, ancient forests, winding rivers, and rolling hills have nurtured thriving ecosystems and sustained Indigenous Peoples since time immemorial. For countless seasons, this region has been home, provider, and teacher. Yet over the last century, industrial activity has carved roads and cleared forests, diminishing the region’s rich biodiversity and weakening its natural resilience to climate change.
This is why we are launching the Climate Resilience Network for BC’s Central Interior, an initiative designed to catalyze the power of local communities as they reclaim their role as stewards of the region’s waters and lands. The network will help create new partnerships and rediscover ones from the past. It will foster shared knowledge and tools, promote the pooling of capacity and resources, and bring together unlikely allies who, despite their differences, share a desire to sustain and revitalize the ecological and economic heart of British Columbia.
Under the guidance of Indigenous communities whose territories span the Central Interior region, the initiative will grow as an expression of their values, rights, and visions for the future. It will also create space for collaboration across diverse political, cultural, social, and economic interests—both Indigenous and settler—which need to be part of any lasting solution.
Over the next five years, the Climate Resilience Network will:
- Build and strengthen relationships among the region’s forest-based communities.
- Conduct regional analyses to identify and protect natural ecosystems at multiple scales.
- Support Indigenous and rural communities with visioning, land-use planning, facilitation, and access to funding.
- Co-create economic futures scenarios that explore viable, community-led transition pathways away from primary forest logging and toward land stewardship that supports biodiversity, climate resilience, and local well-being.
Through thoughtful analysis, visionary planning, and protection of the region’s life-giving forests and waterways, we’re going to prove it’s possible for communities to care for this region’s natural ecosystems in accordance with their deepest cultural, ecological, and economic values.
This work is rooted in the belief that the people who live closest to the land are best positioned to protect it. We’re honoured to walk alongside them.