Reclaiming the land: How the 2 Billion Trees Program is helping one Indigenous community restore forests and community

Project Snapshot:

• Location: Williams Lake, British Columbia
• Trees Planted: Over 900 thousand since 2022 (with an additional 250k still to plant)
• Key Species: Douglas fir, Ponderosa pine, with earlier plantings of spruce and lodgepole pine
• Partners: Sugarcane First Nation, 2 Billion Trees Program, Tree Canada, Tolko Industries, Dynamic Reforestation
• Focus: Post-wildfire recovery, climate resilience, Indigenous leadership
• Community benefits: Healing the land, strengthening cultural identity through reforestation grounded in Traditional Ecological knowledge, and restoring a sense of pride and stewardship in the community
• Next steps: Fill planting, road decommissioning, and ongoing community engagement.

A thoughtful approach to replanting

After the 2017 fires, the community didn’t immediately jump into replanting. Some salvage cutting (cutting of dead, dying, or deteriorating trees) was done to extract standing merchantable timber, but serious replanting efforts didn’t start until 2022. Indeed, the community wanted to take time to reflect on the kind of reforestation it wanted to undertake.

One reason WLFN didn’t immediately begin post-wildfire restoration was that it wanted to take a different tack. For example, the community rejected the idea of the usual 1,600 stems per hectare in favour of a different, ecological-focused density—one that would create wildlife corridors, restore grasslands, and reflect the Traditional Ecological Knowledge passed down through generations. In fact, the previous reforestation density was one of the main reasons why the 2017 fires were so severe. 

Collaborating with the 2 Billion Tree (2BT) program

WLFN’s relationship with the 2BT program has grown since the 2022 project and is now proving invaluable. As John Walker, the community’s stewardship forester, notes, “Although the community didn’t qualify for 2BT’s Mass Planting Funding Stream, it did secure a multi-year agreement through its Indigenous Funding Stream and has built a close, collaborative relationship with the program. It’s been great. We get to work together and bounce ideas off each other.”

Interested in sharing your 2BT success story?

The Reforest Canada Collective (RCC) is always looking to tell the stories of forest restoration projects across Canada that are having meaningful impact on communities and the landscape. If you’d like your project to be featured, contact us at hello@reforestcollective.ca —we’d love to hear from you.