Coming This Week _The Rural Islands Economic Partnership Virtual Forum

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - The 2025 Rural Islands Economic Partnership (RIEP) Virtual Forum is coming up Thursday and Friday, March 6th and 7th. 

Two of the organizers, Francine Carlin and Kate Maddigan are my guests today.

“ It's going to be a jam packed two half days, 9:15 AM to 12:30 PM.  Our virtual events are really unique because we all live on islands or coastal remote communities and don't have the opportunity to get together as a collaborative regional grouping. So it's important to have these virtual events that bring together people from all across the coast and the islands, up from North Island as far as Alert Bay, to Sooke and beyond. So we have a pretty broad reach and this year it's really important, particularly with the events in the world around economic  issues that relate to  our local  economic and social wellbeing,” explained Francine Carlin, Chair of the Rural Islands Economic Partnership. 

“Our theme this year  is adaptation, innovation, and resilience, because in these times you need to be able to adapt to change. You need to be innovative in terms of what you are doing to keep small businesses vibrant and alive during these challenging times and to be resilient.  It's an ongoing process to ensure that we have our sovereignty as a nation. And that we have our local communities and our local economies thriving as best they can.”

“The opening sessions will be looking at our economic snapshot in terms of what exactly and who exactly are we in terms of our population, our economy, our, our health and wellbeing. We're going to follow up with a program around how we share our services. How we can leverage our economies of scale to be more resilient in times of change. Then moving into using  artificial intelligence” Is it a friend or an enemy? Or fremony? (laughter)  You have to find a way to use it so that it doesn't overpower and that we can take advantage of the technologies that have been evolving for the last 30 years.”

 “Day two is looking at economic reconciliation. What is that all about in terms of how we're going to work collaboratively and in concert with the indigenous communities that live and work on these islands and across the remote coast. We're having former MLA, Adam Olson, who is now the Chief Negotiator for the Tsartlip Nation.  One of the reasons that our Southern Gulf Islands got into the Island Coast Economic Trust and was able to apply for funds there was because of his advocacy with the province.  He's going to be speaking to us about working together with Indigenous communities to ensure a diverse and integrated economy over time. The most difficult thing to pull together was what we're calling this Learning Exchange. We're bringing together about nine Representatives of organizations from across the islands and the coast to share everything from housing initiatives and solutions to climate adaptation to food security and social enterprise.”