Remote Arctic wildlife area benefits from U.S foundation funding pledge

A northern national wildlife area is benefiting from a billion-dollar pledge from an American charitable organization.

The Wyss Foundation, a private conservation group, says it will spend C$750,000 over the next three years to help fund an Indigenous guardians program for Edehzhie in the Northwest Territories.

The money is intended to help local people study and manage the vast stretch of forest, wetlands and lakes in an area twice the size of Banff National Park.

The money is part of a billion dollars worth of global conservation spending pledged by the foundation.

Although the Wyss Foundation has long been active in the United States and around the world, this is its first Canadian investment.

The Wyss Campaign for Nature, together with the Nature Conservancy and National Geographic, is making the pledge to encourage and assist governments to conserve about 30 per cent of the planet’s surface by 2030.