2000

March: WestFraser sells coastal holdings in the Great Bear Rainforest and backs out of the Joint Solutions Project. Eight coastal First Nations endorse the principles of Ecosystem-Based Management and take a leadership role in bringing together all parties – including the provincial government, companies, environmentalists, coastal mayors and communities, logging contractors and forest workers- to find a positive way forward.

May 5: The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) designates Clayoquot Sound a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, recognizing its unique and significant global value.

May 29: Logging companies and the four environmental groups create a 'Peace Agreement'. Logging companies agree to moratoria on logging and environmentalists agree to suspend markets campaigns targeting the participating companies.

June: Interfor follows West Fraser’s lead and also leaves the negotiations. In response, environmentalists re-launch an international markets campaign targeting them both.

July 28: Environmentalists and the Coast Forest Conservation Initiative companies establish the Joint Solutions Project (JSP), the first cooperative initiative to promote new solutions to longstanding environmental conflict. Both sides endorse an ecosystem-based approach to land-use planning.

November: The newly elected Liberal provincial government endorses the Great Bear Rainforest Interim Agreement and announces a shortened completion process.

December: The Central Coast planning table reconvenes to continue work on land-use designations. This multi-stakeholder process will help shape the future of BC’s Central Coast through dialogue between representatives from First Nation and Provincial governments, and stakeholders from industry, local communities, workers, small business  and environmental groups.

2001

April 4: All parties at the Central Coast land-use planning table reach an interim  agreement on new protected areas, logging moratoria, an Ecosystem-Based Management framework for all future planning, funds for economic transition and the mitigation of impacts on workers and communities, and the establishment of an independent team of scientists and economists to analyze options for the land. An historic day for British Columbia as the provincial government endorses the Great Bear Rainforest Agreement and signs a new protocol with many coastal First Nations; both accords are based on a new ecosystem-based approach to planning, to be advised by an independent team of scientists and economists known as the Coast Information Team (CIT).

May:  Kitasoo and Gitga’at sign a protocol with environmentalists, logging companies, and tourism and convene a committee to inform the First Nations on land-use plans, EBM, conservation financing, and economic development ideas for their territories.  Becomes known as the Kit Git PIT (Kitasoo, Gitga'at Protocol Implementation Team).

First Nations and evironmental groups begin a pilot project on new approaches to Ecosystem-Based Management, conservation, conservation financing, and economic development.

November 1: The newly elected Liberal provincial government endorses the Great Bear Rainforest Agreement and announces a shortened completion process.

2002

January: The North Coast planning table convenes. The Coast Information Team (CIT) starts its work: developing analyses to help inform Ecosystem-Based Management and economic alternatives for the Great Bear Rainforest region and Haida Gwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands).

March 6: The Haida First Nation launches its claim for aboriginal Title and Rights  to Haida Gwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands) and the surrounding waters with the Supreme Court of BC. On the same day, a celebrated protocol is signed between the Haida and our four participating environmental groups (ForestEthics, Greenpeace, Sierra Club of Canada, BC Chapter, and Rainforest Action Network) that solidifies a strategic alliance based on respect for the earth, waters and culture of Haida Gwaii.

The provincial government, First Nations, forestry companies and environmental groups collaborate to establish the Conservation Investments and Incentives Initiative (CIII), which will explore options for financing conservation and sustainable economic development for the BC coast.

The CIT takes the lead in the developing the Ecosystem-Based Management (EBM) Framework. The EBM Framework sets out a definition of EBM, provides strategic direction, and includes implementation tools and procedural steps to achieve EBM. As a package, the EBM Framework and the EBM handbook aid users with the implementation of EBM and distinguish between activities that are EBM versus those that are not.

Environmental groups continue to work with Coastal First Nations, exploring innovative and diverse economic alternatives to industrial logging such as wilderness  tourism opportunities and the sustainable harvesting of non-timber forest products (NTFPs).

November 12: Staples, one of the largest office supply stores in the world, with 1,400 superstores worldwide, announces it will achieve an average of 30% post-consumer recycled content across all paper products it sells and phase out purchases of paper products from endangered forests, including the Great Bear Rainforest.

2003

January 14: Destructive clearcut logging continues in the Great Bear Rainforest according to David Suzuki Foundation, Forest Watch of British Columbia and the Raincoast Conservation Society. Their joint status report, Clearcutting Canada’s Rainforests, shows that “72% of logging sites analyzed had over 80% of trees removed.” The 2001 commitment to begin to improve forest practices is not being adequately implemented.

March 11: IBM Business Consulting Services (formerly Pricewaterhouse Coopers) report shows that international buyers are increasingly demanding environmentally responsible forest products indicating a significant and lasting shift in the marketplace.

March 28: The Haida Nation and BC provincial government sign a framework agreement to co-manage land-use planning on Haida Gwaii (Queen Charlotte Islands).

June 25: Environmentalists convince the BC provincial government to extend the Orders in Council that were set to expire on the valleys currently under option and interim protection status. The OICs will now expire on June 30, 2004.

June: Haida Gwaii planning forum begins community consultations on land-use planning.

December 12: Central Coast Land Use Planning table reaches historic consensus recommendations for the southern portion of the Great Bear Rainforest.  Stakeholders recommended varying degrees of protection  for  over one million hectares of the region and the adoption of a new approach to managing economic development on the land called Ecosystem-Based Management (EBM).

2004

Spring 2004: Government to government discussions begin between First Nations governments and the BC government. These talks will result in final decisions about the fate of the Great Bear Rainforest. Recommendations from the Central and North Coast planning tables will inform these discussions.

June: The NCLRMP reaches conditional concensus agreement on 35% of the land base being protected from logging, conditional on mining and conservation sectors coming to an agreement. Also, EBM is agreed to for managing the land base.

June 30: Orders in Council expire on the valleys that are currently under option and interim protection status in the central coast portion of  BC’s Great Bear Rainforest. However, new OICs are placed on December 2003 consensus-agreed protected areas except in Wuikinuxv territory where the 2001 OICs are renewed.

July 17: BC government announces acceptance of protected areas and EBM recommendations made during the Central and North Coast Land Use planning tables, but uncertainty remains for elements of the recommendations such as formal definitions of 'Biodiversity Areas'.  Formal government-to-government negotiations between First Nations and the BC government begin.