3.6 Monitoring

Indicator monitoring shows value health and alerts decision-makers when health is approaching a threshold. Once the Parties identify indicators and set thresholds for Plan values, they will need to set up monitoring programs or integrate existing ones. The data they (and Plan Partners) collect on indicators will inform assessments of value health. It will also trigger management responses. In the meantime, the Parties will monitor the development footprint indicators. Additionally, decision-makers will rely on ongoing monitoring related to values, especially priority values in each LMU. The Plan’s values provide a scaffold to bring together monitoring from different sources. This helps decision-makers make the best decisions, even in the absence of formal cumulative effects components.

Indicator monitoring provides information on the health of values, directly or through the state of stressors that affect values.

The Parties and other bodies are already engaged in ongoing monitoring programs within the Region. They can show leadership in co-management by using the Plan’s framework to link these programs, and their outputs, to the values they reflect and with the decision-makers who can affect value health through management actions.

As indicators are identified, the Parties will need to co-develop and implement new monitoring programs where adequate data is not already being collected. Monitoring related to value health should be reported at the scale most relevant for the value, not necessarily at the LMU scale. Monitoring indicators over time is important because it reveals trends and provides context for each point in time. Trends can also be projected into the future to support scenario analysis.

Assessment of monitoring data relative to thresholds triggers management actions but, even in the absence of thresholds, monitoring is important. It builds collective knowledge about a value and shows trends.

The values prioritized for indicator development (Section 3.2, Implementation Action 1) should also be prioritized for monitoring. Timely and effective flow of monitoring information among agencies and governments is essential so it can inform recommendations and decisions.

Development Footprint Monitoring

Effective monitoring and integration of monitoring data into decision-making requires clarity on roles and responsibilities. It also requires a centralized digital ledger for the Region, to be administered by the Commission and accessible to the public. Initially, this will be limited to the development footprint indicators.

Development footprint monitoring will follow these steps, carried out by the responsible body in brackets:

1. Acquire satellite imagery. (Government of Yukon)
2. Interpret satellite images, evaluate which features are human-caused, and create geospatial layers for each indicator. Make these publicly available, for example, through GeoYukon. (Government of Yukon)
3. As new data becomes available, the Commission will acquire it from the Government of Yukon and update the regional ledger. (Commission)
4. Compare updated indicator levels to thresholds, and publicly share the status of each LMU with respect to its thresholds. This process will inform conformity determinations, see also Section 3.7. For example, if the SD and LFD values are between the cautionary and critical thresholds, the LMU status would be “cautionary”. If the indicators are in different ranges, the range of highest concern applies. (Commission)

The effectiveness (specifically the sensitivity criteria) of the development footprint indicators depends heavily on how often monitoring occurs and how often new imagery is updated (acquired, interpreted, and published). Updating some LMUs less often will free up resources to update others more frequently.

The Plan provides a points-based system for prioritizing LMUs for these updates. The system lays out scoring for a variety of factors like LMU designation and where development levels sit relative to thresholds (Appendix 10.6). These factors will be evaluated annually. LMUs with higher scores require more frequent updates.

For example, LMU 1: Tthetäwndëk (Tatonduk) scores 5 points because it has low levels of existing development and current activity. It requires an update at least once every 10 years. In contrast, LMU 11: Goldfields scores 15 because it has higher levels of activity and is approaching the cautionary threshold for one of the indicators. It requires an update at a minimum once every five years. See Appendix 10.6 for complete details on scoring metrics and update frequency requirements.

No LMU will go without updates for longer than ten years. The Parties are responsible for considering this when they plan future updates and for ensuring there are enough resources to complete them. This ensures that each 10-year Plan Review is informed by data updated since the last review. As technologies and access to data improve, the Parties may increase the frequency of updates. Reporting and sharing of development and activity data among industry, governments, and the Commission are key to making informed decisions about how often to update indicators.

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