The Inuvialuit Final Agreement (IFA) states grizzly bears in the ISR will be cooperatively managed to ensure that grizzly bears and their habitat are protected and the harvesting rights of Inuvialuit are preserved. In this spirit, many parties, including WMAC(NS), came together to decide how grizzly bears should be management in the region. The Co-Management Plan for Grizzly Bears in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region (ISR) was adopted in 1998. 

This work is guided the principles of both co-management and sustainable development and includes goals for bears and people alike, acknowledging the complex relationship between the two. 

Goals for managing grizzly bears in the ISR are: 

1. to maintain current population size by ensuring that the total number of bears removed through harvest, defense kills, and illegal hunting each year is sustainable,
   
2. to allow recovery of populations in the event that over-harvest occurs by reducing quotas or closing areas for hunting, and 
   
3. to maintain current areas of grizzly bear habitats.
   

Goals for managing people in the ISR are: 

1. to encourage conservation, wise use, and efficient and ethical hunting practices, 
   
2. to increase our knowledge of grizzly bear ecology by promoting research and exchange of traditional and scientific knowledge, 
   
3. to ensure that management decisions and study results are provided to communities and other stake holders in a timely and meaningful way, 
   
4. to reduce the potential for grizzly bear-people conflicts and defense kills by promoting safe conduct in bear country, 
   
5. to manage human activities to prevent disturbance of grizzly bears and important seasonal habitats, 
   
6. to promote co-operation among Territorial and Federal government agencies and Inuvialuit wildlife co-management boards and other land claim organizations, and 
   
7. to promote co-operation among Canadian and American Territorial, Federal, and State government agencies and wildlife co-management boards and other land claim organizations in the Inuvialuit, Gwich’in, Sahtu, Nunavut, Vuntut Gwitchin settlement areas/regions, and Alaska