It becomes more resilient, more capable of adapting to change, and better able to improve its efforts and sustain itself over time. Sustainable, healthy ecosystems with multiple community benefits. Human communities are part of natural ecosystems. The responsible stewardship of natural resources sustains businesses and families in communities over the long term. Finding the common ground among people who have emotional, symbolic, or economic identification with a place, whether or not they live there, is essential to making decisions about development and resource use that will enable communities and their resource base to survive and thrive.
Human communities plan and act in concert with the natural systems in which they are located.
Appropriately diverse and healthy economies. Vital economies deploy financial, natural and human resources to create, maintain and improve local livelihoods. A diverse industry base helps maintain services, businesses and households when the economy fluctuates. In healthy economies, community residents move toward self-sufficiency and prosperity, local businesses modernize and find new markets, local ownership of homes and businesses increases, and local people and financial institutions invest in the community.