Back to Nature Initiative Moving Ahead

Two years ago, a group of individuals representing over 30 organizations from the youth, planning, environment, recreation, health and education sectors, gathered for a weekend of discussion at Royal Botanical Gardens. Our common concern was the growing disconnect between children and the natural world, and we explored ideas on how we might work together to build capacity within our organizations and sectors so that more of Ontario’s children have access to play and learning outdoors. At the end of the meeting, RBG agreed to secure funding to help build and mobilize an Ontario-wide Back to Nature network that would facilitate multi-sectoral collaboration and raise awareness on this issue.

In 2009, we struck a collaborative partnership with Parks and Recreation Ontario and Ontario Nature, to prepare an application to the Ontario Trillium Foundation to fund the short-term strategic actions noted in the Back to Nature report. Today we are pleased to share the happy news that the Ontario Trillium Foundation has approved funding to support a two-year Back to Nature Network project.