Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to all the presenters this morning.
I have to apologize; I have a bit of a cold and I can only hear out of one ear.
I found it very interesting to hear the presentation of Your Worship Scarrow, because I come from an area where we're about to lose a sawmill and potentially a pulp mill right next door, after the sawmill closes, after they've run out of their commitment to supply the fibre. The impact on the community and the loss of jobs over a period of time and then the spinoff impacts in social services and education are things we have to take into account in all of our communities. It's something that's happening across this country. Indeed, you paint a very stark picture of the crisis that's hitting a lot of our resource communities, and others have said similar things.
We've been hearing from other witnesses throughout these meetings about those impacts and also about what can be done, that there is hope and we can turn this around. It's going to take a huge commitment by our federal government. Yet we didn't see that in this budget, as is my understanding from hearing all of your comments. I want to thank you for painting that picture and laying it out for everyone.
I have some specific questions for Chief Bill Williams with regard to opportunities for first nations. We've heard from other witnesses as well about land use planning and the treaty process and where things are going. When you said most of your communities--the 103 communities in the impacted pine beetle areas--are remote areas, and then remembering that approximately 80% of first nations live in forested areas, it seems to me there's an awful lot of economic opportunities to be had for first nations. I just wonder how any treaty negotiations are going that are increasing participation of first nations in training opportunities, research and development, innovation--that kind of thing. Is there anything within the treaty process to address economic opportunities for first nations in forested areas?