The Collaborative Stewardship Framework is an initiative by the Province of British Columbia intended to enable the Province and Indigenous groups to collaboratively explore, through regional collaborative stewardship forums, shared responsibility for environmental stewardship and options for making resource management decisions within the Province.
This Collaborative Stewardship Forum (CSF) is one of the groups formed out of the Collaborative Stewardship Framework between the S’ólh Téméxw Stewardship Alliance (STSA), the associated Stó:lō First Nations and the Province of British Columbia.
Together, the Province and the STSA are exploring the development and implementation of joint stewardship activities to mitigate impacts to values of importance for environmental sustainability. An overarching purpose of the forum is to co-develop joint recommendations for the possible application, amendment or creation of provincial legislation and regulation, policies, management approaches, and information and monitoring programs relating to environmental stewardship and shared decision-making processes.
The Province and the STSA are approaching these projects with the shared vision of collaboration using the term Lets’emó:t (meaning “one mind” in Halq’emeylem – language of the Stó:lō) to guide their actions. The goal is for the forum to continue to build the foundation for a positive Government-to-Government relationship between the parties and to advance reconciliation based on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the work that evolves from engagement on the Draft Principles that guide the Province of British Columbia’s Relationship with Indigenous Peoples.