Fishing community in the Great Bear Rainforest © Ian McAllister / Raincoast.org

Ecosytem-based Management

Ecosystem-based management is an adaptive approach that seeks to incorporate ecological, socioeconomic and cultural needs into the creation of long-term, sustainable land use implementation plans.

Meeting Modern Conservation Challenges

The conservation challenge in the Great Bear Rainforest is echoed in landscapes around the world. From the Amazon forest to the world's great rivers, we must find ways to integrate the needs of natural systems with the needs of the people who depend upon those natural systems for their livelihoods and their way of life.

The scientific literature behind ecosystem-based management is well-grounded, with roots in conservation biology and ecology. This integrated approach to conservation and socio-economic health across large landscapes is emerging at many places – including the North American boreal forest, the Amazon, the Great Barrier Reef and along many of the world’s great rivers. Ecosystem-based management is an important part of sustainable land management.

Many communities rely on the Great Bear Rainforest for their livelihoods
© Ian McAllister / Raincoast.org

For More Information

To find out more about the scientific and management framework for ecosystem-based management in the Great Bear Rainforest, please visit the Coast Information Team .

The Coast Information Team was established during negotiations between First Nations, governments, industry and environmental organizations. For several years, this team of independent scientists worked to provide the best available science to support the implementation of the new model of ecosystem-based management within the Great Bear Rainforest.

Ecosystem-based Management in
the Great Bear Rainforest

Preserving Landscapes and Livelihoods

The Great Bear Rainforest is a vital natural, cultural and economic resource for First Nations, coastal communities and British Columbia. To be successful here, conservation must be sustainable – ecologically and economically.

The economic challenges facing the people of the Great Bear Rainforest are as important as the conservation challenges. Over the last several years, it has become apparent that the forest cannot sustain historic levels of resource extraction such as industrial logging.

Ecosystem-based management is the commitment of the timber industry and coastal communities to sustainable management practices for timber and other natural and cultural resources of the Great Bear Rainforest. Together with appropriate ecotourism, sustainable fisheries management and other new enterprises, the economy of the Great Bear Rainforest is being rebuilt to last through ecosystem-based management principles by the people who live and work there.

A New Model of Sustainability

Ecosystem-based management in the Great Bear Rainforest seeks to direct the sustainable and cautious use of resources at all scales, from broad landscapes to individual plants.

At the landscape level, a network of new and existing protected areas extending over 5 million acres will protect a core of ecologically and culturally significant areas from logging and other industrial uses. These areas provide the most secure habitat for sensitive native plants and animals, such as the white Spirit bear and many of the most productive salmon streams.
At the watershed level, such as a 20,000-acre river valley, management plans will set aside reserves where little or no resource extraction takes place. These reserves will maintain wildlife habitat and travel corridors, protect waterways and preserve specific values such as threatened species, sensitive soils and cultural, scenic and recreational areas.
At the site level, such as a 250-acre timber stand, forest harvesters will design their logging plans to retain individual trees, or groups of trees, to maintain key habitat features such as streamside forest cover, trees for nesting, or bear or wolf den sites. Logging plans will also seek to sustain ecological process by, for example, leaving large fallen trees in rivers where they form pools and side channels necessary for salmon.

At the regional and community level, these ecosystem-based management plans will be matched with socio-economic plans that aim to generate income, enhance the health of cultures and communities, and provide for sustainable livelihoods.

Challenge and Opportunity

In itself, ecosystem-based management will not address every threat to ecosystem integrity and it will not resolve all the complex issues facing First Nations and other communities. It is, however, the first effort to apply integrated conservation and economic concepts across such a large and complex natural and social landscape.

It is also the first effort to expand ecosystem-based management into a broader policy and legislative context concerned equally with the health of ecosystems and human communities.

The challenge is enormous, but the opportunity is extraordinary. The application of ecosystem-based management in the Great Bear Rainforest presents the world with its best chance yet to realize the vision of integrated, large-scale conservation and community development.