Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I recently read the 2017-2018 ITI Grant and Contribution Report. I was happy to read that $17.6 million was provided to more than 500 individuals, entrepreneurs, businesses, and groups with an economic interest in our territory. Can the Minister of Infrastructure, Tourism and Industry explain how they report on the use of these fund? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Infrastructure, Tourism and Investment.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. ITI supports the economy in a bunch of different ways. The grants and contributions document is a testament to that. It is a roll-up of various ways that we invest in industry, businesses, and entrepreneurs across the Northwest Territories. That said, we also have appropriate but different ways of reporting out of each of these funding areas. We presently have various accounting spending in this House. I have tabled the BDIC report in this House, community futures, investments in the Northwest Territories Tourism Marketing Plan. Staff and myself regularly get out and talk to the chambers across the territory to be able to talk about some of these documents. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Can the Minister verify if these individuals, entrepreneurs, businesses, and groups need to apply yearly, or can they get multi-year funding through this program?
For the most part, applicants to the ITI programming, like the Support to Entrepreneurs and Economic Development Policy, do have to generally apply each year.
I noticed that, on page 4, table 2, "Contributions by clients exceeding $100,000," the NWT and Nunavut Chamber of Mines received $190,600, and on page 8, the table "Contribution funding by major program activities for 2018," there is $100,000 for Aboriginal Development Support Program and $90,600 for the NWT Chamber of Mines. Can the Minister advise if these funds are the same funding?
That is a fairly detailed question. I don't have the document in front of me. If I remember right, we list by client, by region, by sector, by program area, and so on in the document, but I think that I can confirm that there are two different accountings of the same funding.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Nahendeh.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate the Minister giving the answers here today. My final question is: from what I understand, the NWT Chamber of Commerce is responsible for providing funding for the Aboriginal Development Support Program. Can the Minister explain why the department uses a third party, the NWT Chamber of Mines, to allocate these funds? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
This is something that I can talk about for hours, how we are trying to build capacity and participation of Indigenous governments in the mineral resources sector in the Northwest Territories. One of the ways that we are doing that to help grow our economy is through their participation in a number of these industry events. I particularly participate in Geoscience AME Roundup and PDAC. In fact, at PDAC just last week, the chamber hosted an investment event at PDAC. That included presentations and different discussions with Indigenous business leaders and representatives in the mining project sectors across the Northwest Territories by the Chamber of Mines. This is one of the reasons that we have done this through the chamber. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
