Oil boom will bring jobs for everyone
Minister says if Sahtu oil play pans out, region can 'wave goodbye to 30 to 40 per cent unemployment'; some say it's not worth the cost
Chris Puglia
Northern News Services
Published Monday, December 2, 2013
SAHTU
As opposition to horizontal fracking surges, the NWT's minister of industry says future employment for Northerners will hinge on more drilling.
"If there is no activity, there won't be any opportunity for more jobs," said Industry, Tourism and Investment Minister David Ramsay. "Right now, we're trying to ascertain the potential and we're only going to do that by drilling more wells."
Over the next four to five years, an estimated $600 million is expected to be invested in the Mackenzie Valley region to support exploration activity, the minister said.
Although he said he believes work will eventually translate into production, the potential is speculative at the moment, which makes preparedness planning tricky.
However, if the GNWT learned anything from its recent fact-finding mission to the Bakken oil development in Saskatchewan and North Dakota, Ramsay said it is the need to be ready if that potential emerges.
With that in mind, Ramsay said his department, as well as the Department of Education Culture and Employment (ECE), have begun laying the ground work to ensure people in the NWT, and especially the Sahtu, are ready to take advantage of job opportunities as they arise.
ECE's new career development officer and the Aurora College training co-ordinator will both be located in Norman Wells.
As well, ECE Minister Jackson Lafferty added, the Sahtu regional training partnership has a five-year plan to identify and guide training for the region with an increased investment to $800,000. He added that is in conjunction with programs offered in partnership with other agencies, such as the Norman Wells Land Corporation
and CanNor.
Readiness sessions, mobile trades programs and existing trades programs through Aurora College are also in place to help capitalize on a possible oil boom.
"With that oil, there is going to be a great opportunity," said Ramsay. "We're going to wave goodbye to the 30 to 40 per cent unemployment rate in the Mackenzie Valley."
Sahtu MLA Norman Yakeleya said he wants the government to do more to ensure people are prepared for jobs.
Before the end of the last session of the 17th legislative assembly, he proposed an idea to establish a training institute in the Sahtu. Such an institution, modelled after Aurora College or Alberta's SAIT or NAIT, would open the door for people in the region to train close to home and possibly access jobs at higher levels - engineering
or management.
"Oil and gas exploration is going to need a number of workers, and the Sahtu will need to have a skilled labour force," said Yakeleya.
With approximately 675 youth between the ages of 10 and 24 living in the region, Yakeleya said it is vital to ensure there are job opportunities available for those of working age and those coming up through the education system.
"It would be a plus for all our students finishing high school. They will have the option to be trained with an actual trades program in the Sahtu," he said. "We have to capture these young minds and start gearing them toward a skilled trade. If we can't, we'll see more and more southern skilled labourers coming in to take the jobs that could go to our people."
While the assembly supported Yakeleya's motion to study the idea of a possible training centre in the Sahtu and the MLA is hopeful such an institution would be ready to accept students in four year, Ramsay was less optimistic.
"I wouldn't rule it out, but I think it is something we have to aspire to," he said.
Not everyone is happy about the way oil development in the Sahtu is being approached. A Facebook group titled Hydraulic Fracturing Sahtu Discussions, - which has attracted nearly 900 members - has generated heated discussion on the issue. Much of the dialogue has been in opposition to the development because horizontal fracking has been approved for the exploratory wells being drilled by ConocoPhillips.
Although some on the page have written about the need for jobs in the region and looking froward to the economic benefits, many have stated employment is not worth the risk to the environment.
