Formed by the laws of nature over 2 billion years ago, this region of Manitoba was once part of a massive mountain range that eroded over time. Known as the Precambrian or Canadian Shield (figure 1), this huge mass of ancient bedrock literally serves as the foundation for much of North America.

The present day landscape of the Eastside of Lake Winnipeg (figure 2) started evolving some 10,000 years ago after the retreat of the Wisconsin glaciers. This symbolic region of Manitoba's boreal forest is covered by a blanket of coniferous and deciduous trees, ponds, bogs, tumbling rivers, laced together by a multitude of lakes, eventually draining into Lake Winnipeg - the sixth largest freshwater body in North America and the last remaining remnants of 11,000 year old glacial Lake Agassiz.

The vast, relatively undisturbed expanse of boreal forest on the Eastside provides one of the last remaining large intact habitats for the Atikaki-Berens and Owl-Flinstone herds of threatened woodland caribou in Manitoba. They share the forests with other wildlife typical of the boreal forest: beaver, river otters, marten, lynx, moose, wolves, black bears, and wolverines.

The Kasakeemeemisekak Islands that hug the eastern shore of Lake Winnipeg, just northeast of Black Island, are recognized internationally as significant nesting habitat for colonial water birds, especially the American White Pelican. Throughout the spring and summer months, the boreal forest of the Eastside ring out with the melodic sounds of warblers and a host of other migratory songbirds, while bald eagles watch from their lofty aeries.

The Indigenous people, who make up the majority of the population in the region, have lived on the Eastside of Lake Winnipeg for over 8,000 years or "as long as the sun shines, the grass grows and the river flows". The area provides an abundance of natural resources for those who still continue to hunt, fish, trap, harvest wild rice or gather traditional medicines in their traditional territories. Ancient and important sacred sites, dating back thousands of years, can be found in numbers on the Eastside of Lake Winnipeg. It is also where legend has it that Manidoo Abi (The Creator) sits.

This region also played and continues to play an important economic role in Manitoba, as the Winnipeg- based North West Company and its rival the Hudson Bay Company undertook extensive fur trading with Aboriginal and Metis trappers who traveled the vast network of fur trading routes in the region in the 1800s.

The first hydroelectric projects in Manitoba were constructed in the region in the 1900s on the Winnipeg River, starting with the Pinawa dam, followed by the Pointe du Bois generation station and then Great Falls and Seven Sisters. With the exception of Pinawa, decommissioned in 1951, these early hydro projects still continue to supply energy to Winnipeg and points beyond.

Mining, especially in and around Nopiming Park, played an important economic role in the region starting in the 1900s with the discovery of gold, and still continues to this day with the operation of the Rice Lake Gold Mine, in Bissett.

By 1927 the area was a hub of logging activity for Manitoba with the creation of Manitoba's first pulp and paper mill in Pine Falls by the Manitoba Pulp and Paper Company, which under Tembec's ownership, still operates in the region to this day.

Currently, this region of Manitoba is home to no less than six provincial parks and one interim protected area: Grand Beach Provincial Park, the Whiteshell Provincial Park, a portion of Helca/Grandstone Provincial Park, the Manigotagan River Provincial Park, Nopiming and Aitaki Wilderness Park, and the Poplar River Interim Protected Area.

All of these parks provide a wide and diverse range of recreational opportunities for those who are fortunate enough to own cottages or cabins in the region, or for the great many who simply come to enjoy the many splendid campgrounds, the multitude of hiking trails or to take advantage of the fishing and hunting opportunities the area has to offer. Those who are more adventurous come to canoe the numerous remote world-class wild rivers and lakes that can be found on the Eastside, or enjoy the many winter recreational opportunities such as ice fishing, cross-county skiing, dog sledding, snowshoing and/or snowmobiling.

So unique is the natural and cultural heritage of the Eastside of Lake Winnipeg that a 4.3 million-hectare portion of this region was identified as a prime candidate for United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Site designation (figure 3) when Canada unveiled its updated Tentative List for World Heritage Sites in April of 2004. To be considered for inclusion on Canada's Tentative List as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, an area has to have a high potential to meet outstanding universal values, as defined by the World Heritage Committee, and meet qualifying conditions of authenticity, integrity and protection.

The criteria used in determining the outstanding universal values of this particular site on the Eastside of Lake Winnipeg include the important fact that it represents an outstanding example of traditional use by Aboriginal people in the boreal eco-zone, and that it exemplifies a land use representative of a culture and human interaction with that environment.

In addition, the area has exceptional natural scenic values, with wild rivers and extensive undisturbed boreal forests, lakes and wetlands. The region also demonstrates a range of ecological processes relating to glacial history and fire ecology and it contains a good variety of species typical of the region as well as one threatened species and one species of special concern.

The World Heritage List is a means of acknowledging that some places, either natural or cultural, are of such sufficient importance that they ought to be recognized by the international community as a whole. Membership on the List is the most significant global designation any site can achieve.

The proposed boundary of this potential World Heritage Site currently encompasses the traditional territories of four First Nations communities, three in Manitoba and one in Northwestern Ontario, and would include Aitaki Wilderness Park and Woodland Caribou Park - both these parks straddle the Manitoba/Ontario boarder.

In February 2007, the four First Nations communities of Poplar River, Little Grand Rapids, Paunigassi, and Pikangikum, and the governments of Manitoba and Ontario, announced the establishment of the Pimachiowin-Aki non-profit corporation as part of their goal to achieve international recognition for lands east of Lake Winnipeg in Manitoba and Northwestern Ontario as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.