As you mentioned, the land is situated in a beautiful area of the country. It's also an area that is well known for the high quality metallurgical coking coal resource that is available there. Parts of the Dominion Coal Blocks have been identified as being very prospective from that perspective, so a sale of these lands would permit the development of this resource, which would contribute both to the economy of the region and more broadly to the Canadian economy.
On November 18th, 2013. See this statement in context.