There are over 800 parks, protected areas and ecological reserves in British Columbia covering nearly 13% of the province's land base. In spite of this, large land areas still warrant protection from industrial development along with ecosystems that are insufficiently represented, such as Vancouver Islands Garry Oak meadows. Other threats to our world famous parks system include chronic funding shortages, lack of connectivity between parks, increased commercialization and proposed logging, mining and road construction that have steadily eroded our world class wilderness heritage.

BC Parks - A World Famous Legacy

Wilderness Committee Educational Report Vol.23-No.05 - Summer 2004

A Vision for BC Parks

For over 20 years the Wilderness Committee has worked with our members to protect BC’s spectacular wild places. Vision and hard work have resulted in a park system that have helped make BC world famous. From the mighty Tatshenshini to Pinecone Burke, BC’s network of parks and protected areas is a proud public legacy. But if we are to maintain this legacy for our children we need to protect our public parks against cutbacks, privatization and industrial development. We must ensure that parks, which are enormous revenue generators, are adequately funded and staffed by the provincial government, and we must ensure that the BC Park Act remains inviolate — protecting our parks for the public good, not private gain.

The BC provincial government appears to have missed the point as they continue to pursue an agenda of privatizing and commercializing our provincial parks. They have lost sight of what British Columbians think is the single most important aspect of our protected areas system: to set wilderness areas aside for the sole purpose of preserving natural areas.