Doug Ashbury
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Dec 01/99) - The amount of money resource companies are forecasted to spend on exploration in the NWT and Nunavut is down substantially from prior years, according to the latest figures.

Natural Resources Canada figures, obtained from the NWT Bureau of Statistics, forecast exploration spending to be $86.3 million in 1999 in the NWT and Nunavut combined. This is a decline from $112.8 million spent looking for minerals in 1998 and an even bigger decline from the $150.7 million spent in 1997.

Driven by diamond exploration, spending peaked in 1996 at $194.5 million.

There is less "grass-roots exploration," said NWT Chamber of Mines general manager Mike Vaydik.

People who normally would have been out in the field this past summer were not, he said.

Vaydik added it would be realistic to see 30-40 exploration camps carrying on work in the NWT and Nunavut. When doing a quick count, however, he could only come up with nine camps.

"The junior mining companies are non-existent," said Malcolm McLean, vice-president of Yellowknife company Discovery Mining Services.

"They just can't raise the capital. It's the established mining companies developing existing properties."

As for the total number of active projects, Jason Sharp, a district geologist with DIAND in Yellowknife, said there are about 80 across the two territories. That's down from 115 in 1997, he adds.

"Without the diamond camp (which accounts for about half the total exploration expenditures), the territories would be in a world of hurt," he said.