Salish Sea Initiative Interactive Map

The Salish Sea Initiative (SSI) is a Government of Canada, Trans Mountain Expansion (TMX) Accommodation Measure designed to respond to First Nations concerns about the potential environmental impacts of human activities on coastal and marine ecosystems in the Salish Sea. Led by Fisheries and Oceans Canada, the SSI aims to support the capacity building of eligible First Nations within and around the Salish Sea to plan, develop and conduct marine stewardship activities, including environmental monitoring, traditional use studies, and cumulative effects assessments. Thirty-three First Nations are eligible to participate in SSI and the initiative runs until March 2024. A key component of the SSI is the co-development of the SSI Interactive Map (SSIM). The SSIM is a user-friendly, decision support tool that displays data layers of natural marine environmental components, stressors and Indigenous cultural components. The purpose of the map is to provide a platform for SSI participants to visualize valued components (VCs) and other information that will be useful for project planning, implementation of marine stewardship work and cumulative effects assessments. The map is associated with a data catalogue and portal and functions are being created to enable data analysis. The map also serves as a communication tool to host conversations between SSI participants and between SSI participants and the Government of Canada. Enhanced communication capabilities provide support for project planning and coordination, the creation of partnerships, as well as a shared platform for inter-generational knowledge transfer opportunities within communities. The purpose of this presentation is to outline the background and process associated with the SSIM creation and to provide a demonstration to show the work completed to date. We will also highlight future actions to be taken for map enhancement.