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NWT
With the number of people hunting gold, silver, or other metals on the land these days dwindling, some say the return of the Prospectors Grubstake Program to the NWT will revive the "dying breed" of the prospector.

Prospector Walt Humphries shows a rock sample during an Amazing Family Sundays event about rocks and geology in the NWT at the Prince of Wales Heritage Museum in October 2005. - NNSL file photo

While most prospectors work out of passion, it costs money to fly, boat, and snowmobile vast distances in search of the next great deposit, and after a five-year absence, the GNWT has renewed the program that might prompt a rejuvenation of this grassroots level of exploration.

"Prospectors aren't a dying breed because they aren't of any use," said Tom Hoefer, executive director of the NWT and Nunavut Chamber of Mines. "They're a dying breed, I think, because people just haven't seen that there's an opportunity to become one."

The program, which provides financial assistance to qualified NWT prospectors to search for mineral occurrences, might even help "build a new generation of prospectors," Hoefer said.

David Ramsay, minister of the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, announced annual funding of $50,000 for the program at the legislative assembly on Feb. 10., highlighting the importance of mining to the economic foundation of the territory.

"Before mining can take place, we rely on the work of prospectors and exploration companies to identify potential mineral development opportunities," Ramsay said. "This grassroots exploration is part of our economic foundation and is a key element in the discovery of new potential mineral deposits."

Ramsay pointed to historical gold finds that led to the Giant and Con mines and the work of now-famous prospectors Chuck Fipke and Stewart Blusson, who found diamonds at Lac de Gras, leading to the largest staking rush in Canadian history, and the establishment of Ekati -- the country's first diamond mine.

Exploration creates jobs, generates income for NWT businesses, and encourages infrastructure development, Ramsay said -- aspects of the field prospector Walt Humphries has seen first-hand, in more than 40 years of prospecting.

"There's been millions of dollars spent on the properties I've optioned to companies," Humphries said. "That's what a prospector does, you find a property, get something interesting and then you find a company, and they come in and spend the big dollars.

"That's money brought into the NWT economy. It generates work and revenue for the territories."

Humphries has been a recipient of the Grubstake program in the past, when it was administered by the Northwest Territories Geoscience Office. The program was discontinued under the Prospectors Grubstake name in 2008, when there was a decline in applications at the same time the government was undergoing fiscal restraint.

The Department of Industry, Tourism, and Investment says the program was never technically discontinued, because funding for prospecting activities has always been available under the department's Support to Entrepreneurs and Economic Development (SEED) policy, which the Grubstake Program is being funded under now.

The chamber was not actively lobbying for the return of the program, but was disappointed when it was lost in 2008.

"So we're happy that it's back," Hoefer said.

The chamber is also looking into a geoscience field assistance program -- to train people in the art of prospecting -- with the government and college, and hopes to see one launched this year.

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