About the Wilderness Tourism Association

  About | WTA Board of Directors | Profile - WTA President | Profile - WTA Executive Director

The Wilderness Tourism Association exists to ensure the ongoing viability of our industry through the protection of the wilderness tourism land base.

The WTA believes that wilderness tourism is a viable and sustainable economic enterprise, and that BC's wilderness tourism operators must have a strong voice in determining how the lands upon which they depend are planned and developed.

To ensure that the wilderness tourism industry's requirements are recognized and incorporated in land use decisions, the WTA is undertaking organizing, advocacy, and education to profile the contribution of our industry to the provincial economy.

The Wilderness Tourism Association is managed by an elected Board of Directors with Brian Gunn currently sitting as President.

The Wilderness Tourism Association of BC (WTA) was born out of a need to have an organization that would be focused on land use issues faced by nature based tourism operators. It has its roots in a previous organization called the "Wilderness Tourism Council" a group of ten who represented approximately 850 nature based businesses during the 1980's. Ric Careless, who spent many years as a conservationist developing and preserving protected areas and is currently with BC Spaces for Nature, was the Executive Director. The council eventually blossomed into the Council for Tourism Associations (COTA) in 1993.

In 1999, after the Tourism Land Use Symposium in Vancouver, Ric Careless was approached by Brian Gunn, who with others, wanted to create an organization that would give nature based tourism operators a stronger voice in dealing with forestry and tenure issues. With cooperation from COTA, the WTA was born. Brian became the President of the WTA and Ric served as the first Executive Director, a position he held until 2006. There are ten elected members on the Board of Directors. Our present Executive Director is Evan Loveless, who joined us in January of this year (2008). Today, in addition to the issues of tenure and forestry, the WTA also helps operators with land use conflicts, making park use affordable, and preserving wild salmon.

Wilderness tourism is a rapidly expanding industry and as the number of people recreating in wilderness areas grows, so does the potential for significant environmental degradation. To ensure that the development of wilderness tourism in BC is viable and sustainable, we encourage our members to be stewards of the environment and to operate their businesses in the 'greenest' way possible.

The WTA is undertaking organizing, advocacy, and education to bring this about. We are providing a voice for backcountry operators and making sure that the wilderness tourism industry's requirements are recognized and incorporated in land use decisions. We are also building a Wilderness Stewardship Fund, so that we can contribute financially to projects that will help us preserve our wildlife - such as the rehabilitation of the Glendale Salmon Spawning Channel, which was undertaken in July 2007.

Through our new publication, 'Be Wild in BC', we hope to reach a wider audience so that visitors to BC can participate in our issues and help to make a difference.