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 Marg Baile and her husband Jake Ootes, show some of the products available for sale at their shop on the second floor of the Explorer Hotel. The couple say their customers demand diamonds that are both mined and processed in the North. - Brent Reaney/NNSL photo |
"It's not based on fact. It's based on addressing the political needs of the mines," Stephen Ben-Oliel, president of the Canadian Diamond Manufacturers' Association and Sirius Diamonds.
Prepared by Canadian and Territorial mining associations, the report was released last week as an industry response to the national diamond strategy being developed by the provincial and territorial governments.
"In the absence of subsidies and other forms of support from government it is questionable if cutting and polishing operations could continue to operate," the report said.
The report also said that Yellowknife polishing operations pay low wages, have high employee turnover because they employ foreign workers who don't want to stay in the North.
Employee turnover was previously a problem, Ben-Oliel said, but proper training and development have solved it.
Sirius is operating at full capacity, with a work force that is 75 per cent Canadian, earning an average of $23 an hour, Ben-Oliel said.
The report also questioned how much added value is brought to diamonds mined and processed in the North.
Northern diamonds wanted
Marg Baile has run a small diamond retail operation in Yellowknife for about three years, and said her customers want truly Northern diamonds.
"That's what people in Yellowknife want, that's what people who travel here want. They only want a diamond that's from the North, and cut and polished in the north," Baile said.
Jake Ootes, Baile's husband and business partner, was a member of the government that developed the territorial diamond policy.
Ootes said he understands the benefit mining companies bring to the North, but doesn't think the recommendations concerning local value-added industries are fair.
"I don't think we should backtrack from the original intent of developing the valuation, the polishing and the cutting industries.
"It's the only thing that provides benefits outside of the mines themselves," Ootes said.
