Fisheries Committee on Feb. 15th, 2011

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Do they see that the potential exists for them to both increase their levels of education, as you discussed, increase the levels of economic development and at the same time participate in an environmentally sound economic development and participate to the extent that they want in their traditional way of life? Is their vision for what they want, based on your work, that they want the best of both worlds?

[Prof. Louis Fortier]

They do actually want the best of both worlds. We think we can achieve a true exchange of knowledge, both Inuit expertise and southern scientific knowledge. Actually, it is the vision of ArcticNet. It's a Canadian Arctic where, through the exchange of that knowledge, the coordination of the understanding of the environment and what's coming in terms of climate change and modernization, the well-being of Inuit people and northerners in general will be better than what it could have been if we hadn't done that.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Do you foresee the day when students who participated on the ship last year will eventually be graduate students at Laval, perhaps, and then end up being researchers themselves on the Amundsen?

[Prof. Louis Fortier]

It's been one of the driving objectives of ArcticNet since the start to improve access for Inuit to post-secondary schooling. We soon realized that to achieve that we needed actually to revamp the K-to-12 schooling system.

Now, through those excess revenues that we have with the oil and gas partnerships in the Beaufort Sea, two of the 12 programs that I mentioned are exactly on that, that is, how to rebuild the education program not only for post-secondary, but for the entire education program. This is conducted in close collaboration, of course, with Inuit governances in the Arctic.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Thank you.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Lawrence MacAulay]

Thank you very much, Mr. Sopuck.

I want to thank you, and I would like to ask you one question. You indicated you invested or spent $2.7 million. Is that for the Amundsen? Where do you get that money?

[Prof. Louis Fortier]

This is from the NCE grant that we receive. I'm not supposed to tell you what the new grant that we have starting in 2011 is, because the official announcement has not been made by the government. But let's say that we--

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Lawrence MacAulay]

Be careful or you won't get it.

[Prof. Louis Fortier]

We had $6.4 million in the first seven-year cycle, and out of that $6.4 million we used $2.2 million every year to charter the Amundsen to support ArcticNet's research program.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Lawrence MacAulay]

Thank you very much for appearing, Mr. Fortier.

The meeting is adjourned.