The Stewardship Network of Ontario (SNO) aims to promote the best practices of its member organizations and champion new initiatives, says Owen Williams, stewardship liaison, Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR).

Demonstrating leadership is one of the network’s four strategic goals for the 2007 - 2008 year, in keeping with its vision of enhancing the capacity of its member groups.

“When SNO was developing its stewardship strategy, one of the most prominent needs identified by our audience related to the difficulty for both stewardship organizations and landowners to stay current with ‘who is doing what’ in stewardship,” says Williams.

The difficulty stems from the fact that there are dozens of leading organizations each with many programs that ebb and flow with available funding.

SNO has addressed the objective of clarifying what organizations are doing well by giving key organizations the opportunity to explain their best initiatives to members of the SNO community.

Williams says SNO has done this particularly well at its two annual meetings.

“The dialogue with stewardship organizations helps the lead organization refine their program,” he says. “The stewardship organizations gain a clearer understanding of the specific program and how it fits with the overall strategy and purpose of the lead organization.”

The SNO also aims to be instrumental in championing new initiatives in the stewardship field at large.

“SNO’s Stewardship Strategy has identified the larger scale actions and objectives that need to be addressed over the long term,” says Williams. “We watch for the stewardship initiatives that contribute to attainment of these actions and objectives and work together to champion those initiatives.”

The SNO recently helped develop and champion MNR’s Species at Risk (SAR) stewardship initiative.

As the SAR legislation development was nearing completion, the SNO steering committee invited the MNR SAR stewardship program lead to attend a steering committee meeting to discuss the initiative.

“Our discussions helped the MNR design the SAR stewardship initiative and enabled the SNO steering committee members to gain a positive appreciation for the value of the SAR stewardship program,” says Williams.

This in turn led to a profile of the SAR stewardship program at the annual SNO meeting as well as prominent coverage on the SNO website.

Williams explains that landowners are justifiably cautious about the SAR legislation and its impact on their use of their land

“SNO member organizations accept the importance of conservation of SAR, yet also comprehend the necessity of dealing fairly with landowners.”

The SNO Steering Committee is in the process of helping the SAR stewardship initiative find a balance in this area, he says.

In addition to demonstrating leadership, SNO’s three other 2007 - 2008 strategic action items include collaborating to enhance community capacity and support effective incentives for stewardship, jointly strengthening access to knowledge and support, and strengthening public policy support for stewardship.

For more information about the SNO, see www.stewardshipcentre.on.ca.

— part two of a two-part series

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