Natural Resources committee  I'd say it's primarily based on cold climate innovation. Being in a relatively isolated jurisdiction in Canada, our business community has had to become very innovative because businesses here often work in isolation and don't have access to the specialized personnel or materials they require.

Natural Resources committee  I don't have those exact figures in front of me, but I would estimate probably 70%. Some are families.

Natural Resources committee  Yes, primarily working in the service industry.

Natural Resources committee  It's 36,000.

Natural Resources committee  Certainly, more support can always be had. Yukon has been very successful in their apprenticeship training program. I believe some of our numbers are skewed because our population is low. When you get outside the capital city of Whitehorse into the communities, it skews the numbers because the unemployment rates are much higher, and I think there are more pressing issues in terms of society in the communities, where a lot of the people are not employable for a variety of reasons.

Natural Resources committee  Training for business is actually something that we've been working on. For about five to eight years before 2002, the Yukon was experiencing a severe reduction in its economic activity, and we found that a lot of our small businesses became very small. They moved back towards an owner-operator type of situation.

Natural Resources committee  Certainly, investment in the mine training fund.... Canada has invested heavily in it, but more investment is required. That has been very successful in getting Yukoners working in the resource development area. Other activities that I'm involved in include developing skills model tables.

Natural Resources committee  With the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Act, we feel we have that regulatory certainty. There are timelines entrenched in the regulations whereby not only the review committee has to respond to project applications but the proponents as well. That really has been instrumental in the Yukon moving forward with its resource development in the area of mining, but it also encompasses all other land-based activities.

Natural Resources committee  Absolutely. We find it leaves a real hole when we're looking at development projects or environmental issues, because honestly, not everybody is on the same page as to where we want to be going.

Natural Resources committee  It is the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Act. It's a piece of federal legislation and the acronym is YESAA. Pardon me for doing that part way through my presentation.

Natural Resources committee  Probably, I do. I mean an economic strategy to forecast where it is we want to go, how we're going to get there, and the challenges we're going to have to overcome as we go along.

Natural Resources committee  In the Yukon we have no net debt and from everything I hear, from all politicians, there is no interest or desire to bring the territory into debt. We're quite happy with the situation that we have now.

Natural Resources committee  As a business organization, we always support private sector activities and involvement in our economy. We don't currently have the capacity to support a mine of that size from an energy perspective, and I know that the company is looking at generating its own power. From our perspective, that's the way it should be.

Natural Resources committee  No, that's not what I'm saying at all actually. Yukon benefited from investment in hydroelectric power, most recently with contributions from the federal government as well as the Yukon government in the expansion of our Mayo B hydro dam. It's been very beneficial to the territories.

Natural Resources committee  Certainly our penetration in the European market would not be what it is today without the investment in the Erik Nielsen Whitehorse International Airport. Due to regulations through Canada Customs, the airport was at threat of being shut down from accepting international flights.