First Nations, municipalities, regional governments, and the community members they represent bear the burden of managing environmental degradation and biodiversity loss caused by the cumulative effects of landscape disturbance and climate change. They are also well-positioned to identify practical solutions that support the broader biodiversity conservation goals of Canada’s 2030 Nature Strategy.

Ecological connectivity networks are vital in linking existing protected areas and safeguarding patterns of movement for critters and the ecosystem functions that they depend on for survival. Led by examples from the Squamish Nation’s Sacred Land Use Plan, land managers across the S2S region have collectively raised the alarm and begun integrating biodiversity conservation and connectivity policies into their strategic land-use and resource-management plans. What has been missing until now is a shared understanding of how our landscape is changing in response to an expanding human footprint, and a capacity to identify and map ecological connectivity networks and dedicated wildlife corridors that provide both refuge and pathways of movement to buffer the effects of an expanding human footprint and changing climate regimes.