Y2Y honored with award for Partnership Excellence by Saulteau First Nations
In October 2024, Saulteau First Nations, a longtime partner of Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative (Y2Y), held their first annual Healing the Land Conference in Moberly Lake, British Columbia (B.C.) within Treaty 8 territory.
Nicole Olivier, Y2Y’s landscape protection manager, represented our team at the conference, where Indigenous leaders, federal, provincial, and local governments, conservationists, restoration practitioners, and industry representatives gathered to discuss land healing and restoration.
The conference offered a unique opportunity to explore successful partnerships, collaborative restoration and protection efforts, and emerging technologies that honor Indigenous knowledge systems shaping the future of land restoration.
Celebrating our collective impact for people and nature
At the conference, Y2Y was honored with the award for ‘Partnership Excellence’ by Saulteau First Nations.
We at Y2Y have been proud to support Saulteau First Nations’ collaborative projects over the past decade to recover, protect and heal landscapes for community members, caribou and other wildlife. This partnership award recognizes our efforts to positively impact the environment and economy and respond to community needs through this partnership.
“Y2Y works to connect and protect habitat from Yellowstone to the Yukon so people and nature can thrive, and collaboration is at the heart of all that we strive to do,” said Nicole during the awards ceremony.
“Y2Y’s promise was to create a network that achieves together what no one can do alone. We have always striven to fulfill this promise by providing financial and other resources to partners, commissioning studies, organizing coalitions, and filling in gaps where needed. This is the core of our collective impact, and we are so grateful for the work of Saulteau First Nations in healing the land.”
Indigenous Fancy Dancer and Partnership Excellence award granted to Y2Y at Saulteau First Nations’ 2024 Healing the Land Conference in Moberly Lake, B.C. Credit: Nicole Olivier.
Remarks from the Nation recognized Y2Y’s support of local priorities and needs, and helping to increase community awareness for Saulteau First Nations’ projects through videos and storytelling, such as through the film Caribou Homeland.
This award also recognized our ongoing commitment to impactful and meaningful ecological restoration in the Peace River region of northeast B.C.
“The Peace is the area most impacted by industrial development in the Yellowstone to Yukon region; and it is among the most impacted in North America,” says Tim Burkhart, Y2Y’s landscape protection director.
“Working in support of Saulteau First Nations’ efforts to heal the land is an honor, and I continue to be awed by the creativity and innovation that Saulteau and other Treaty 8 First Nations demonstrate in healing the land, in caretaking and recovering endangered species like caribou, and bringing community together.”
Thank you to our partners at Saulteau First Nations.
Y2Y is proud to continue making a difference together, supporting local priorities, helping to revitalize caribou populations, defending Treaty Rights, and promoting community awareness through impactful storytelling and conservation.
Watch this video re-cap from Saulteau First Nations of the 2024 Healing the Land Conference.
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