Thanks for your question.
First of all, not as much as Alberta, but we've been very challenged because of what has happened with the energy sector, particularly south of this city in Weyburn and Estevan. Hotels were running at 80%; now some of them are at less than 50% and some are even lower than that. There are major challenges in those areas, as well as in Lloydminster and places where the energy sector is very important. There are some significant challenges there.
I've heard different things about OPEC and what's going to happen in terms of price. Hopefully, there's price stability somewhere along the line, which would help a lot of us. It would help the country, actually, if we had some price stability. That's one area that we're concerned about. We're not as reliant on energy as Alberta, but it's still very important to Saskatchewan.
Obviously the next area is the potash industry, which is very important to Saskatchewan. The price is not great right now. Hopefully we'll see prices move, but that will really depend on the global economy. There is some optimism there, though. We have the K+S mine that's being built here just outside Regina, not too far. The Yancoal project that has been talked about quite a bit—50 or 60 kilometres from Regina—is another major project. There has been expansion in a lot of potash mines throughout the province. That has been good and it has helped carry us through some of these challenging times in the economy.
There's one thing, though. Not all that long ago, people looked at agriculture and said, okay, all right, because agriculture didn't do that great. Agriculture has really been, in many ways, saving Saskatchewan, but is that going to last forever? I don't know. It's a good question. Thankfully, we do have agriculture that has been helping. The crops this year seem to be good. The prices seem to be less because the U.S. crops seem to be much better.
In terms of our outlook on the future, it's really difficult to say what's going to happen, because we are very much a commodity-based economy. I think that's a great thing in some ways; there's no question about that. We need to continue to diversity to ensure that we have an economy that's not so boom-bust reliant. We're not the only province in Canada that goes through that. I know in the Maritimes it's the fishing industry, and there are other places where the mining industry is very important.
For us, what's really important as we move ahead is that we have the environment that is conducive to continued growth. My fear, with the utmost respect, is if the western Canadian economy doesn't perform to where it has been, I don't think that's going to be good for the country. That's my concern.