"The Fish and Wildlife Service today [Wednesday] unveiled a sweeping, multistate plan to protect the monarch butterfly without adding it to the Endangered Species Act list.
A long time in the making, the plan called, in part, a 'candidate conservation' agreement unites state and federal officials with energy and transportation industry leaders on a common cause.
'Completing this agreement is a huge boost for the conservation of monarch butterflies and other pollinators on a landscape scale,' FWS chief Aurelia Skipwith said in a statement, adding that it will 'provide regulatory certainty for industry while addressing the conservation needs of our most at-risk species.'
The agreement reached between the service and the University of Illinois, Chicago, 'encourages transportation and energy partners to participate in monarch conservation by providing and maintaining habitat' on rights of way and associated lands, according to FWS."
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