Tides Canada completes Canadian fundraising campaign for The Great Bear Rainforest with $500,000 pledge from RBC
Vancouver, February 25, 2008
Tides Canada Foundation is extremely pleased to announce that Royal Bank of Canada (RBC), has pledged half a million dollars to help preserve and protect the Great Bear Rainforest. RBC’s contribution completes Tides Canada’s $4 million fundraising commitment and also completes the $60 million in financing pledged by Canadian and international private philanthropic organizations for the conservation project.
Canadian donors led by the North Growth Foundation, together with The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, Wilburforce Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and The Nature Conservancy, contributed the $60 million.
The private contributions, combined with the $60 million previously committed by the governments of Canada and British Columbia, will create two funds totalling $120 million to support conservation management and sustainable economic development in First Nations communities in the region.
About The Great Bear Rainforest
Representing twenty-five percent (25 %) of the Earth’s remaining ancient coastal temperate rainforests, the Great Bear Rainforest is a global environmental treasure. It is also a vital cultural and economic resource for British Columbia’s coastal First Nations and other communities.
Until recently, the Great Bear Rainforest was a threatened wilderness. But on February 8, 2006, after over a decade of exceptionally hard work, an unprecedented alliance among environmental groups, First Nations, logging companies and governments marked a landmark event in modern conservation. The Province of British Columbia and coastal First Nations announced long-awaited land use agreements that protect at least 5 million acres of the rainforest from logging and place more than 18 million acres under an ecologically sensitive new land management framework known as ecosystem-based management.
The Great Bear Rainforest – the largest, most significant integrated conservation project in North America - is a model for the future and the first practical example of how environmental protection and the economic health of a vast region can be secured in tandem.
Tides Canada led the Canadian fundraising initiative to aid the implementation of land use agreements and to promote sustainability in the Great Bear Rainforest. The foundation and its partners also supported early coalition-building and scientific research that contributed to the agreements.
“The success of Tides Canada’s campaign would not have been possible without the vision and commitment of our donors to this pioneering model for long-term sustainability,” said Ross McMillan, President of Tides Canada Foundation, and one of the principal architects of the $120 million conservation financing project. “While we celebrate completing the initial campaign, our work in the Great Bear Rainforest continues. Tides Canada will provide future support to conservation organizations and First Nations for the successful implementation of land use agreements and ecosystem-based management.”
About Tides Canada Foundation
As Canada’s first and only national public foundation focused on the environment and social justice, Tides Canada works with forward-looking donors to amplify the impact of their giving. For more information about Tides Canada Foundation and the Great Bear Rainforest campaign please visit http://tidescanadafoundation.org/greatbear/.
