Thank you for the question.
I think the difference is the partnerships on the land right from the beginning.
To be clear, this is work we've supported and enabled. The role of the Canadian Mountain Network is to build the relationships, sustain the relationships and manage all of the administration that takes away from the work on the ground so that the work can be done on the land.
The difference is that these groups were facing a problem that was insurmountable. When you sit down together and bring the decision-makers to the table from the very beginning, that is how you transfer the science and the knowledge into the policy and the decision-making.
If we are successful in receiving the strategic science fund, one of the first additions to our governance structure will be a federal advisory panel to work with our research management committee—our indigenous circle of advisers and our researchers—so that we can talk about shared priorities and understanding and serve as a liaison. In examples like this with the caribou, we can share those learnings.
If you do the research and you publish the paper, it doesn't get into the policy and regulation. We have learned that over and over again. How is it done? It's done when you work together right from the very start all the way to the end. The end is also through adaptive governance, adaptive policy and regulatory reform to ensure the regulations you've developed are indeed protective. Those relationships are sustained for a significant period of time. That is where success is.