Prioritized Terrestrial Portfolio: Ecoregional Conservation Assessment for the Central Interior

The Central Interior Ecoregional Assessment brought together professionals from the Nature Conservancy of Canada, provincial
government ministries, and academic researchers
to complete a conservation-based scientific
analysis of the Central Interior region of British
Columbia. With the completion of this assessment,
the Conservancy has developed conservation
plans for the vast majority of British Columbia
(Nature Conservancy of Canada 2010a).

The conservation portfolios depict a set of
conservation areas that most efficiently meet a specific
set of conservation goals defined for the ecoregion (see
Maps 22 and 24 from Nature Conservancy of Canada,
2010b). The conservation areas identified in each
portfolio are important for a number of reasons. First,
some are the only places where one or more species or
plant community targets are known to occur. This is
particularly true for those associated with low-elevation,
old-growth coniferous forests. Second, some areas
such as parks and wilderness areas form the last large,
relatively undisturbed landscapes in the ecoregion,
which are especially important to wide-ranging species
such as grizzly bears, wolverines, and fishers. These
places are vital to conserving ecoregional biodiversity
and maintaining landscape-scale ecological processes.
Third, wherever possible, the portfolios identify areas
where conservation is most likely to be successful.