First of all, when you look at the aboriginal broadcasting industry, it's a very young industry. It's about 20 years old. When you think about what's been accomplished over that short period, it's incredible.
I think what we have, as aboriginal broadcasters, is a real special connection to our listeners. The former chief of Tadoule Lake, Ila Bussidor, was visiting Winnipeg, and I remember she said, “I love coming to Winnipeg and listening to NCI because it reminds me of home.” What other station could accomplish...? Because we have such a connection to the aboriginal people, we're part of home. We're not just another radio station. We're not just playing music and filling in the blanks with commercials. We're connecting with people, and language is really a big part of that. We broadcast Cree and Ojibway languages.
In terms of the CBC, the number one point that separates us from CBC is having native languages. I think I made the point with the game show: where CBC could air a segment, we can air a half-hour show, as opposed to a segment.
Ultimately, there's that distance between CBC and the aboriginal audience throughout Manitoba. As I mentioned, we have 67% of the first nation audiences listening in Manitoba right now outside of Winnipeg. That's going to grow. We're under a lot of pressure, actually, as an aboriginal group, because the population is rising in the urban centres. When we first came to Winnipeg in 1999, we saw events happen once every three months. Then they were every month, and now they're happening every few weeks. As broadcasters, we're to cover these events, we're to provide service of these events, and we have to keep a revenue base rising to meet the challenge.
Let me tell you this: in terms of aboriginal languages, there's not a lot of money to be made. We're providing services to remote areas that otherwise would not get language radio, and we're doing that out of our own pockets. We're also providing employment opportunities for people with language who otherwise wouldn't have those.
I see it continually growing. In fact, we're at a point where in the future there will be a secondary aboriginal station needed just for the city of Winnipeg, I believe, and a network for the rest of the province. That's where things are going. And I know that because I'm at the front lines of everything happening.