Author: Dr. Kari Roberts
On October 29, 2007 the Canada West Foundation hosted Policy Pioneers: Exploring International Land Stewardship Options. The conference was designed to investigate and understand best practices and policy options available to land users and managers to achieve environmental sustainability and agricultural viability in western Canada. The one-day event brought together pioneers of innovative public policy with stakeholders and decision-makers. Presenters offered international insight into how to reconcile environmental, social and economic objectives in planning for the long-term sustainability of our natural capital.
The conference was designed to create an opportunity for stakeholders and government representatives to learn from the experiences of other jurisdictions. Over 80 participants heard presentations from five international experts from Australia, Europe and the US, and then participated in a series of facilitated roundtables in which they had the opportunity to share and discuss land use and sustainability issues in their own communities.
The presentations highlighted a diversity of experiences and perspectives and served as an excellent launching point for an important discussion about the way we understand and manage our natural capital and how to design public policy that will best enable land users to act in ways that replace, maintain or build natural capital assets to ensure the sustainability of our communities into the future. Throughout this fruitful discussion, a number of recurring themes presented themselves, which may provide useful advice for policy-makers and land managers moving forward. These themes are discussed below, following an overview of the presentations from the panel of international experts.