Thank you, Mr. Speaker. My questions are for the Minister of ITI. I talked about the potential in the Sahtu region with our human resources, our people and with the resources in our lands.
I want to ask the Minister, has he had an opportunity to look at the opportunities of the economic potential in the Sahtu region with our people in our lands? Does he have a quick snapshot picture of what’s there?
Thank you, Mr. Yakeleya. The Minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. We’ve got a great idea of what’s in the Member’s riding in the Sahtu. Over the past four years, we’ve spent $8.5 million in funding in the region. We’ve got the greatest potential, of course, with oil and gas and the resource assessment that was done in the central Mackenzie Valley, indicating that there’s close to 200 billion barrels of oil and the benefits, and the development of that could mean potential business opportunities and employment opportunities for residents in the Sahtu.
We also had seen a great advance in agriculture in the Member’s riding. I know Mr. Whiteman is back at potato farming this year and there’s a number of others in communities in the Sahtu who are getting into agriculture.
We’ve also seen an advancement on the traditional economy. Harvesting furs continues to be a source of income in the Member’s riding. I believe in the Sahtu we’ve got close to 100 trappers in the area and they harvest some of the best fur in the Northwest Territories.
We also have to look at tourism and the opportunities tourism is going to provide. The federal government is going to be moving forward with the cleanup of the Canol Trail. Some of that work has started. As the Member knows, earlier this year we had 18 local residents employed on the cleanup. The $800,000, or close to $800,000 flowed through the Department of ITI and we’re happy to see that work start. The federal government indicates it’s going to take up to five years to clean up the Canol in advance of us fulfilling a commitment in the Sahtu Agreement to turn that into a park, and we fully intend on doing that as soon as that trail is remediated. Thank you.
Thank you. The Minister clearly laid out the amazing potential we have in the Sahtu. I want to ask the Minister, has he and his officials looked at one area that he hadn’t mentioned today, which is the Selwyn-Chihong Mine that’s at the Yukon/Northwest Territories border? I understand this mine is going to go into production. There’s close to $1 billion worth of work there, potentially with 850 workers during the construction phase and around 450 permanent workers to operate that mine.
Has the Minister looked at how we can match the young potential workers in the Sahtu with this upcoming mine that is close to $1 billion worth of operation?
The Selwyn-Chihong Project, which straddles the Yukon-Northwest Territories border, holds great promise and great potential not only for the Sahtu, but for the Northwest Territories and the Yukon. It is a world-class lead-zinc deposit, as the Member indicated, with somewhere around 800 to 850 permanent jobs. I know the company has been into a number of communities in the Sahtu. They’ve been talking to the leadership in the Sahtu about potential IBAs and other opportunities for the Sahtu when it comes to the development of that project. We’re very excited. Initial mine plans had the company looking at mining on the Yukon side at first, but it looks as though the company is going to be mining potentially on both sides of the border, which bodes well for the Northwest Territories and this is a great opportunity for us.
Also in the area of mining, we’ve had some great results from our NWT Geological Survey that would indicate that there’s gold and tungsten in a number of the stream sampling programs that we had conducted last summer. So there’s great potential in the Sahtu for mining. Thank you.
Certainly, that raises our hopes in the region. I want to ask the Minister, has he been working with his other colleagues with regards to bringing in some much needed skill development, trade development, in regards to, for example, the Selwyn-Chihong Mine operations, bringing in some type of trades program with the Mine Training Society to look at how do we tap into these young resources of workers in the Sahtu region to increase our viability to be in the mine and not have situations where we see where we fly in miners to take the jobs from our Sahtu people, our northern people?
Because of the exploration and the little bit of drilling that happened in the Sahtu a couple of years ago, there are folks there that are trained. But the Member’s correct. I mean, we have to be ensuring that the young people are ready for the jobs that are coming, whether they’re in oil and gas or whether they’re in the mining sector. We continue to work closely with the Department of Education, Culture and Employment. I know the Minister had a statement earlier, Skills 4 Success. We’ve got the Mine Training Society of the Northwest Territories, as well, and we have to do everything we can as a government to ensure that our folks are ready to take these opportunities and run with them. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I want to just ask the Minister about the traditional economy. Now, that’s the backbone of our people. It was a way of life until we started to look at the European value of exchange. The economy is still strong. Colville Lake and Fort Good Hope have the best fur harvesters in the Northwest Territories.
I want to ask the Minister, is his department working with the trappers in the region, specifically around Fort Good Hope and Colville Lake, in regards to seeing that this tradition is continued to be passed on to the younger generation? The best furs, I may say humbly, come from the Sahtu region, specifically in the Gahcho area.
We continue to work with ENR on the traditional economy on the area of trapping. As I mentioned to the Member, there are currently approximately 100 trappers in the Sahtu. We actively support the marketing of the Genuine Mackenzie Valley Fur Program. Over the past four years, they’ve averaged about $370,000 per year in fur sales and an additional $84,000 in fur bonus and grubstake payments to trappers. Over the four years, the total for Sahtu trappers is nearly $2 million, so it’s a tremendous opportunity. This money goes directly back into trappers’ pockets and back into local economies in the Sahtu.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Mr. Yakeleya.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, can I seek unanimous consent of yourself and the Members to return to item 5?
---Unanimous consent granted
