Rethinking Protected Area Management in British Columbia, Canada: Ecosystem Principles for Sustainability Transitions

Canada’s commitment to conserving 30% of its lands and oceans by 2030 is an incredibly ambitious objective requiring immense political and strategic effort. Despite initiatives by federal, provincial, territorial, and Indigenous governments, this target remains distant. This paper identifies key threats faced by protected area (PA) experts to achieve conservation objectives. Major obstacles include recreational overuse, resource extraction, habitat fragmentation, and political–economic pressures. To guide land management and maintain ecological integrity, the study illustrates the value of planning strategies, such as linking land cover with ecosystem dynamics. This relationship provides a pragmatic strategy for the administration of PAs while acknowledging the necessity for a more intricate, ecosystem-oriented approach. Using legal and policy analysis as well as semi-structured interviews with key conservation stakeholders throughout British Columbia (BC), this paper contends that applying ecosystem principles can assist managers of PAs to identify planning opportunities to more effectively reconcile conservation and recreational priorities while supporting climate resilience.