Foreign Affairs Committee on March 7th, 2013

[Danielle Labonté]

I wouldn't want to presume that we'll be asking for more money in the future. I think the mandate that the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development has is quite broad, and there's a lot of opportunity to re-calibrate within that mandate as priorities change or issues come up.

One of the big drivers of what we will look like in the future within our organization is the post-devolution world, I guess. We are getting close to an agreement with the Northwest Territories, and we will be transferring some of our responsibilities and our staff who go with that, and we'll eventually do the same with Nunavut. There will always remain a core northern affairs unless, at some point, there's a machinery discussion, which is well beyond my ability to comment on. We would still have a role in overall coordination and playing into the Arctic Council sphere.

Concerning wildlife and the changing north, some of the issues you raised very much play into some of the key science work that's going on in the various working groups and task forces of the Arctic Council, in terms of adaptation. The science is trying to respond to those emerging trends.

[Mark Eyking, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

We already had Transport in here and Defence here a bit. I see DFO having to play a major role up there, and we haven't had them here yet. In Atlantic Canada, DFO works with ACOA, so everybody has to work together on the whole thing. How much are you going to do? What are you going to do with DFO, dealing with the fish species and the mammals, if there's going to be a major shift going on here? With the increased traffic and with other countries thinking that they can fish, how are you going to play a role with DFO on the whole economic part of that?

[Mitch Bloom]

Certainly, from our perspective—

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Mr. Bloom, there's time to answer the question, but that's all the time you have, Mark. Just go ahead and answer the question. Thanks.

[Mitch Bloom]

Thank you. I'll be brief, Mr. Chair.

DFO does a great job of managing our international relations, with fish management agreements that cover the planet, effectively. They're really, really onto that.

From an economic development perspective, those projects have an impact on fish and fish environment. We work very closely with DFO to make sure we're getting the right environmental outcomes. As those projects go forward, they're part of the environmental assessment process.

Fisheries themselves are interesting. There are active, growing fisheries, especially in Nunavut, and that's wonderful. It will be interesting to watch that in the years ahead.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Go ahead, Ms. Labonté, very quickly.

[Danielle Labonté]

Mr. Chairman, if I could just add that the Minister of Aboriginal Affairs has a champion role in terms of the northern strategy, and we do have a governance table at the deputy minister and ADM levels that tries to do that coordination across government, and DFO is part of that. As that becomes an issue, this will be something that will definitely be considered within the northern strategy as well.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you.

To our witnesses, thank you very much. I'm sorry we couldn't be here for the full hour. We appreciate the testimony and a quick round. Thank you.

Just before we suspend, I have a motion that the necessary arrangements be made and the necessary funds be allocated to the committee's hospitality budget for an informal meeting and lunch with Dr. Andrei Lankov, associate professor at Kookmin University on March 25.

(Motion agreed to)

Thank you so much.

We're suspended. We'll come back here after a vote, which I'm thinking will probably be at least ten minutes after the hour. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

We'll get back now. Thank you very much to our witnesses for being patient and flexible with us, as we had a couple of votes this morning.

Here, joining us in Ottawa, we have, from the Students On Ice Foundation, Geoff Green, who is the founder and executive director. Welcome, Geoff. We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Then via teleconference from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, we have Greg Poelzer, who's the director, International Centre for Northern Governance and Development, University of Saskatchewan. Greg, welcome, via phone. How are you today, sir?

[Prof. Greg Poelzer, Director, International Centre for Northern Governance and Development, University of Saskatchewan, As an Individual]

Tremendous. Thanks very kindly.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Excellent.

Greg, why don't we start with your testimony and then we'll move over to Geoff for his testimony?

So, Greg, you have the floor for 10 minutes, and we look forward to hearing your testimony.

[Prof. Greg Poelzer]

You bet, and thanks for the opportunity to present.

There are three parts to the presentation that I want to provide today. One is just putting some context around the north and Canada's northern or Arctic foreign policy. Second, I want to identify two particular areas that I think would be worthwhile for the Canadian government to focus on. The last part is to look at a couple of challenges I think Canada confronts around building knowledge and support around Canada's Arctic foreign policy.

First, and I'm stealing a bit from the title of a book that I thought was a very thoughtful one by Laurence C. Smith, The World in 2050, and looking at northern futures in a circumpolar context, of course Canada is one of the major players, the second largest after Russia. There are four areas that are going to frame and shape the future of the north, particularly international relations in the north.

One, of course, is globalization and the increased interaction globally and interest in the north, but also among the Arctic partners themselves. Really over the last 25 years it has accelerated in the circumpolar north.

The second, of course, is natural resources and the demand for natural resources, which are abundant in the circumpolar region. It's no secret to anyone here that this demand is only going to increase, driven by a third factor, which of course is demographic changes. The demographic change in areas such as India, China, and Brazil, and so on, in those humming economies, is going to put further pressure on resource demand, not only as their economies grow but actually as their populations grow as well.

Climate change is also a very important factor, and everyone knows potentially for transportation, shipping...though less likely a factor for Canada, but destination shipping certainly will be.

The last, the fifth, would be in the area of governance, particularly around devolution, the increasing illegal regime in the north, and around aboriginal rights and the empowerment of aboriginal peoples, not only in Canada but in other circumpolar countries.

Those factors are going to play a significant role in the nature and context of circumpolar relations and how we should look at Canadian Arctic foreign policy and northern policy. I'm sure the committee has heard many things in repeating patterns on what Canada ought to do, but I want to bring in two in particular that may have less attention than what conventionally gets brought forward. One is the need to bring in the provincial north, and the second is to establish greater leadership and capacity building.

On the first one, the provincial north, one of the challenges that comes up in Arctic Council, comes up in other circumpolar Arctic foreign policy discussions, is that the provincial north is almost always excluded or not included in considerations of Canada's northern or Arctic policy, and really I think that's to the detriment of Canada. It's certainly detrimental to northerners. If you look at the provincial north, we're looking at about 1.5 million people, whether they are in northern British Columbia, northern Ontario, northern Quebec, Labrador. That region contains most of Canada's natural resource wealth. Linking that with the territorial north, I think, is critically important as we move forward in the 21st century in defining Canada's northern foreign policy.

There is a natural community of interest between residents of the provincial and territorial north, everything from the climate to the bio-environment, the economies, and demographics. Just to point out one example, northern Saskatchewan, the northern administrative district, which is roughly half the territory of the province of Saskatchewan, has a higher aboriginal population as a percentage than does the territory of Nunavut.

The second area is in terms of leadership and capacity building.

It is probably well known to members of the committee that Canada is the only country of the Arctic eight that doesn't have a university in its Arctic region, so that focus on education is important. There's been a greater focus on research, but I think it's important to bring in the circumpolar and, as a dimension of our foreign policy, build those education and research linkages.

But I wouldn't stop there in terms of establishing leadership and capacity building. It's more than training and research or education and research. It also means we are building stronger businesses, business linkages, economic linkages, and government linkages, particularly municipal, first nations, Métis, and Inuit organizations and governments, and obviously territorial and provincial north government organizations.

Where there's been success, especially in the Barents region, in terms of building economic and governance capacity, there's been considerable effort placed by those governments, as part of their foreign policies, on business-government linkages and building capacity in the north.

One other area that's worthy of consideration is military investment and greater military investment in our Canadian north. If you look in comparison to other regions, such as Alaska, northern Norway, northern Sweden, the investments in military facilities, for instance, have had very important civilian spinoffs, in everything from telecommunications to research capacity and so forth. The University of Alaska Fairbanks would not be the world-class research institution in geophysics, environmental research, and so on were it not for the investments around the U.S. military. I think that's really important to state.

In northern Norway, for example, not only is there northern air command, but the national air command is based in Bodø, Norway. Again, that creates a hub of activity and resources that help northern regions in terms of economic opportunities, capacity building, communications and so forth.

A final dimension that I want to bring to the presentation is about the challenges for building Canadian support around our northern policy and interest in engagement. The reality is that Canada, for the most part, is a southern country in terms of its population, though certainly not in terms of its geographic land mass. Most of the population, as is well known, lives within a couple hundred kilometres of the United States border.

There are two other demographic changes that I think present a challenge for Canada. Number one is the number of intergenerational urban Canadians. If we look at 30 years ago, most Canadians either came from a rural area or had relatives living in a rural area. The natural connection to northern, rural, and aboriginal issues was certainly much stronger then. What we've had over the last 30 years is a shift. You have intergenerational urban Canadians, and there aren't the natural linkages to the rural areas, or to the north or aboriginal issues. I think that plays heavily, to our detriment, in terms of the connection to the importance of Canada's northern foreign policy.

The second demographic change is new Canadians. New Canadians are critically important to the past, present, and future of Canada. Culturally, economically, and so forth, new Canadians bring a vitality to the country. Most new Canadians settle in urban areas. Half of those people in Canada's largest city were not born in Canada. Just as with intergenerational urban Canadians, there isn't a natural connection to rural Canada, northern Canada, or aboriginal Canada.

In terms of garnering greater support and interest—because it's in Canada's interest to be engaged in our northern foreign policy—I think those two demographics need to be addressed in a systematic way. If we add that to the emphasis on leadership and capacity building in the fullest dimension, as well as a very concerted and explicit effort to include the provincial north in Canada's foreign policy, I think those would be worthwhile considerations as Canada moves forward.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much, Greg.

We will move to Geoff Green now.

We'll take his presentation, and then we'll follow with questions for the remaining 30 or so minutes.

Mr. Green, I turn the floor over to you.

[Geoff Green, Founder and Executive Directeur, Students on Ice Foundation]

Thank you, Chair. Bonjour, everyone. Thank you for the invitation and opportunity to speak today. I really appreciate it.

I want to apologize for not speaking French today.

I first went to the Arctic in 1994 on an expedition to the top of Ellesmere Island. Little did I know at the time that this first Arctic journey would be one of the turns in my life's path and an experience that would go on to define my career and, really, my life in many ways. Soon after it led me to the Antarctic. Someone figured that, since I'd been to the Arctic, I must know something about the Antarctic, so I agreed with them. In reality I barely knew the difference between a polar bear and a penguin, but away I went.

In the two decades since, I've had the great fortune to lead over 80 expeditions to the Antarctic and 40-odd expeditions and projects throughout the circumpolar Arctic. I've sailed through the Northwest Passage three times, stood on the tops of remote mountains and glaciers, and looked into the eyes of polar bears and bowhead whales. I've listened to and learned from Inuit elders, participated in scientific research, and witnessed firsthand the impacts of climate change, including being stuck up to my knees in melting permafrost. I've walked into the depths of one of the first mining operations in the Canadian Arctic and I've had very emotional conversations with Inuit youth about why suicide should not be considered an option. From the pure awe and wonder of the land to the traditional knowledge and remarkable resiliency of the Inuit, the Arctic has cast a spell on me like it has on so many others.

My Inuktitut name is Pitsiulak, which was given to me by Ann Hanson, the commissioner of Nunavut at the time. A pitsiulak is a black guillemot, a small Arctic bird with bright red feet. It's also in the name of Peter Pitsiulak who was a great educator and artist from Cape Dorset. The school in Cape Dorset is named after Peter. That name has come to mean a lot of things to me but is mostly a reinforcement of my connection to our north and its people.

I've come to appreciate and understand how the polar regions truly are the cornerstones of our global ecosystem and how everything is interconnected in between. Like the battery in your car, if the two poles are not connected, your car doesn't start. The polar regions of our planet are critical to the way the oceans circulate, the stability of our climate, and, really, to life on earth as we know it and enjoy it. In this way and many others, the Arctic and the Antarctic are windows to our world. They're remarkable symbols of peace and understanding and of collaboration and conservation.

I would be remiss if I did not mention that Canada remains a non-consultative member of the Antarctic Treaty. Becoming a full member of the Antarctic Treaty would be warmly welcomed on the international stage and would certainly serve to strengthen our position as a great polar nation and add weight to our Arctic foreign policy at very little cost.

The Canadian Arctic is so many things. It is our biggest coastline that links our nation from sea to sea to sea and represents 40% of our land mass. I love the idea of changing our national motto to include the Arctic Ocean: A Mari usque ad Mare usque ad Mare. Wouldn't that be a profound way to help celebrate Canada's upcoming sesquicentennial in 2017?

The Arctic is a huge part of Canadian identity. We are a polar nation. We would be very different as a nation and a people if it were not for this vast land and ocean stretching above us all the way to the North Pole. As Bernie Funston likes to say, and I know he presented to you recently, the Arctic is a “homeland, a frontier, a laboratory and a wilderness”. I'd like to add to that list because I believe it is also the world's greatest classroom.

In 1999, I founded Students on Ice, a program to take youth from across Canada and around the world on educational expeditions to the Arctic and the Antarctic. In the last 13 years we've taken over 2,000 students from 52 countries on these journeys; secondary and post-secondary students from every province and territory in Canada, including hundreds of northern aboriginal youth from the Yukon to Nunatsiavut. We've also had students from countries such as Afghanistan, Iran, Russia, New Zealand, Chile, South Africa, China, India, Israel, and Palestine.

On each ship-based expedition, the students travel with world-class teams of educators, elders, scientists, experts, artists, musicians, and leaders of all stripes—even politicians. Today, I'd like to invite all of you to join us on a future Arctic expedition. The next one is in July.

We've worked closely with members of Parliament, senators, congressmen and congresswomen, premiers, presidents, and even princes. Prince Albert II of Monaco is the honorary chair of my board of advisers.

Together with these partners, we're active in all kinds of related global educational initiatives. We reach hundreds of thousands of youth each year through conferences, new media, and different activities. Our growing alumni and alumni program are really well positioned to champion Arctic Council initiatives that respond to the needs of northern Canadians and connect the themes of Canada's Arctic Council chairmanship, Canada's Arctic foreign policy, and northern strategy objectives.

We possess, together with these students, a unique convening power to bring together many diverse stakeholders on Arctic issues. The impact and outcomes on the students, as you can imagine, are diverse, quite extraordinary, and quite inspiring, from personal levels to becoming Arctic ambassadors, by sharing their experiences with their communities back home, and in many cases representing Canada on an international stage. Most recently, some of the alumni tabled the International Youth Arctic Declaration at the senior Arctic officials' meeting of the Arctic Council in Luleå, Sweden.

All the students are fully supported by scholarships via our Students on Ice Foundation, and that's thanks to generous support from private and public sector partners. I can safely say that if not for Canada, Students on Ice would not exist, and we've been blessed to work with all kinds of government departments from INAC, Heritage, Environment, DFAIT, Canadian Wildlife Service, Parks Canada, and the list goes on. We are also quite involved in the International Polar Year, and the Canadian Museum of Nature is our biggest partner.

I want to commend this committee for the important and timely initiative that you're taking on. There's a perfect storm of governance challenges and opportunities that face the Canadian government with respect to the Arctic region. Canada's upcoming chairmanship of the Arctic Council puts us in a great position to lead, to show Canadians in the world why we are a great polar nation, and to make the decisions that we can be proud of and that will benefit generations to come.

I would also like to urge the committee to take a long-term view of international sustainable development in the Arctic. I strongly support the ecosystem-based managed and balanced approach to economic development and protecting the environment in the Arctic, as stated in the foreign policy. We must keep in mind at all times that good human industrial activities can have unintended effects. A recent example is about how narwhal whales migrating out of summer feeding grounds in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago into Baffin Bay were turned back by seismic exploration. The whales of course use echolocation in a quiet ocean to hunt and navigate. They became trapped at breathing holes in the channels of the islands until it was too late for them to reach open water, when the holes froze up. They starved, and they died.

In 2008, about 1,000 trapped narwhals were counted near Pond Inlet. This kind of problem will likely increase as industrial activity increases, unless it's mitigated and studied properly. Certainly, the petroleum exploration people never intended to kill thousands of whales several hundred kilometres distant from their operations. It shows how in the Arctic, all activities, both human and natural, are connected. Even short-term activities can have long-term impacts.

Canada has identified environmental stewardship as being central to the sustainable development of the natural resources in the north, and that's great. Achieving this will require building leadership in the north and proving the capacity of northern communities to respond to the challenges and opportunities, especially due to the result of climate change.

I'd like to focus my remaining comments on the important role education will play in all of this, because it's truly fundamental. Broadly speaking, there are two main areas of education in dire need of improvement vis-à-vis the Arctic: education in the north for northerners and northern youth, and public education in the south about the north.

Across the Arctic, there are children and youth full of curiosity, hope, and dreams, and some amazing young emerging leaders, whom we should be proud of.

But too many of these youth are struggling, to put it mildly. I'm sure you're aware of the appalling statistics and circumstances: 75% of Inuit youth are not graduating from high school; many don't attend school; and 56% of the Inuit population are under the age of 25. It is a bit of a recipe for disaster. That's why it's such an urgent issue. And of course this educational disparity between non-aboriginal and aboriginal Canadians exists across the country; it's one of our greatest challenges.

What does improving education in the north mean? It's not just a matter of implementing new systems and curriculum. Improving this situation is intrinsically linked to some very basic needs, such as for adequate housing infrastructure. Sustainable, healthy, prosperous, and well-educated northern communities must be a pillar and priority in our Arctic policies.

Initiatives such as the 2011 national strategy on Inuit education, the Nunavut Sivuniksavut program here in Ottawa, the Nunavut Arctic College, and the new Amaujaq National Centre for Inuit Education are doing great work in this area and deserve more support.

With regard to public education and understanding about the Arctic for southern Canadians, there remains a remarkable void and disconnect. As an anecdotal example, during a recent workshop that my team was giving at one of Canada's teachers' colleges, the question was asked, how many of you learned about the Arctic in school? Not one of the teachers raised a hand. As a polar nation, we still have very little Arctic-related curriculum in our mainstream education systems. We need to change this.

Canada can and should be a leader in Arctic education. Our youth love to learn about the Arctic—its history, culture, flora, fauna, sciences, the contemporary issues facing the Arctic. As a platform for education I've never seen anything that comes close to the Arctic. Filling this void is also about bridging north and south, building trust and understanding, breaking down the misconceptions and stereotypes. It's also about preparing our youth in the best possible way for the future. We must take on this active role on so many levels.

With regard to climate change, from an educator's point of view it is our responsibility to help prepare this next generation for the kind of world they'll be living in as adults. During one of my many polar journeys with Dr. Fred Roots, one of our country's legendary polar statesmen, he said to us:

To pass a torch in civilization, just as in a relay race, the person you are passing it to has to be ready to take it or else it will get dropped. It is the duty of all of us to say enough about what kind of a race we are in, and what are the rules of that race, before we pass the torch.

As an aside, Dr. Roots dropped a flagpole on the North Pole in 1969, well before our Russian neighbours did in 2007. However, when he dropped the flagpole, it had all the flags of the United Nations on it. It's still there today; what a remarkable gesture—much more symbolic and appropriate.

To conclude, there are four education-related projects I wish to share with you that I think would be wonderful ways to showcase and build on Canada's arctic foreign policy, northern strategy, and chairmanship.

The first is Polar House, or Arctic House, a national centre to raise awareness about and to celebrate the past, present, and future of the Arctic.

The concept of a national centre to support Canada's Arctic is not new. In 1987, the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs published the report Canada and Polar Science. One of its chief recommendations was the establishment of a polar house or Arctic house.

I worked quite a lot on this throughout the IPY, and there is a full business plan that I'd be happy to share with any of you. It would support Canada's Arctic foreign policy by building public support for the exercise of Canadian sovereignty, a platform for policy, technical dialogue, education, social and economic development, environmental protection, and on and on it goes.

Other countries, such as Norway, Russia, and New Zealand, have polar houses, and I think Canada deserves a polar house. I even have a location, if you're interested.

The second project is the creation of a global, unique polar or Arctic school, an international, semester-based school based in the capital region that would draw youth from across Canada and around the world to study Arctic issues, build knowledge and capacity, and have a field school component whereby students then participate as interns in scientific, northern community-based development projects and expeditions in the Arctic. A broad range of partnerships would make this a global, unique, Canadian initiative.

The third is the establishment of an ongoing Youth Arctic Council, a parallel organization. Our youth represent the true sustainable future of the Arctic. Engaging them at an early stage in the workings of the Arctic Council would empower them to act as champions and catalysts, which would assist and actually feed the real Arctic Council with vision, ideas, and strategic planning. They could probably talk as well about things that the real Arctic Council can't talk about. This Youth Arctic Council could meet both physically and virtually, and it could be a great outcome of our chairmanship.

Lastly is the virtual Arctic project, for which we're already working on phase one, in partnership with the Museum of Nature and Heritage Canada. It's an educational resource for Canadian youth from coast to coast to coast, and it is a project that will go a long way to fill that void of Arctic curriculum in Canada.

Merci beaucoup.

I look forward to any questions and to helping make these initiatives and others a reality in the future.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Mr. Green.

We're going to start with Mr. Bevington for six minutes.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I heard most of what has been said here by the two witnesses and I try to glean from it the difference between national policy and international policy, which at foreign affairs is our emphasis. Of course the discussion about the Arctic Council is definitely in the purview of international affairs.

Right now, the minister has indicated, the broad theme of the Canadian chairmanship will be economic development, resource development, development of the north. Over the past seven years, the collaborative efforts of Arctic nations on the Arctic Council has been on environment, to the greatest extent: to deal with the most pressing issues that internationally affect the Arctic; to look at ways whereby international agreements can be struck to protect the Arctic; to deal with the changing conditions of the Arctic.

My concern, and I want both of you to address it, is whether, if we focus on national issues at the Arctic Council, we will lose the impetus that has been placed within the Arctic Council to this point on developing international agreements to protect the Arctic and to deal with the changing conditions of the Arctic.

Mr. Poelzer, perhaps you could go first.

[Prof. Greg Poelzer]

To me, these are very much two sides of the one coin. Even if you look at what the Arctic Council has worked on—and there has been a heavy emphasis on environmental issues, and rightly so—their work has also been in the context of oil and gas guidelines and so on. That's a reality in terms of resource development in the north, whether it's between Norway and Russia or for everything from fisheries to oil and gas off Greenland and in our own Arctic region. Addressing both together is critically important; it's not simply one or the other.

So I agree that there needs to be emphasis on environment, but equally there needs to be attention to economic and resource development. A lot of this has international implications. I point of course to Norway and Russia, which have engaged in a lot of discussion, but it also involves our own Arctic, particularly in the Beaufort and between Canada and the United States.

I see those two things as two sides of one coin.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

But those two agreements were worked out outside the Arctic Council; those were worked out between countries that had specific economic interests in those areas. Is that not correct?

[Prof. Greg Poelzer]

In those particular instances it absolutely is correct. But things such as oil and gas recommendations—

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

I'll get Mr. Green to answer now, because there isn't much time here.

[Geoff Green]

I'm not an Arctic Council expert. I'm the facilitator. But I think they are interconnected, the domestic and the foreign nature of the Arctic Council. I think we need to be careful during our chairmanship not to have too much of a domestic agenda because it is clearly an international body.

The relationship between the environmental aspects of the council's work and the economic—it's so interconnected. The reason why, as we know, things are ramping up and more and more development is happening is a direct result of the sea ice melting, and so it has to be a balanced approach. As an add-on to that, we shouldn't rush into these issues at all. We need to take our time.

An Inuit elder said to me the other day that when they hunt caribou, they let the first of the caribou go by and then they wait and they wait, and then they shoot the caribou near the end. They don't jump at the first opportunities. I think we need to take that approach with the way we develop the Arctic.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

And of course with fishing right now, wouldn't you say that with that resource in particular, as there is no fishing going on there right now, this is the time to establish international agreements that can guide any potential development of that resource and also ensure that resource is well protected? If you don't do it now, you may lose the opportunity to do it at all.

[Geoff Green]

It's probably the best example. It's the last really great fishery on the planet and we have a remarkable opportunity to learn from past mistakes and develop a fishery that will be sustainable and long-lasting. I think it's probably the best example we have that is quite achievable.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you very much.

We're going to move over to Ms. Brown now, for six minutes.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to both of our witnesses today. This has been a most interesting project for us at the foreign affairs committee, so thank you for your involvement.

Mr. Poelzer, I'm really pleased to hear you talk about those two areas. You said that we need to bring in the provincial north and we need to strengthen capacity building. I'm sure you're aware that both of those are under our northern strategy. We heard earlier today from Danielle Labonté, who is the director general for northern policy and science integration, and she talked about that—I'm reading from her script—“...the Government of Canada is committed to providing northerners with more control over their economic and political future”. So we know that there is a great need to give them more autonomy, as it were.

We also heard from Mitch Bloom, who told us that there is a great initiative there in starting to do skills development with the colleges. Yes, we know there isn't a university there yet, but the critical piece is to get so many of these young people to finish high school, which is an important part of the steps that we need to go forward.

I think, Mr. Green, you were talking about having the long-term view as well, and saying that we have to get the first steps right.

I'm very interested in pursuing this piece on education that you're talking about. As a teenager my parents offered each of their eight children the opportunity for a trip somewhere in the world for our 16th birthday present. I went with an organization called Ship's School Association, which provided us with learning opportunities as well as site visits. I chose the Orient. Two of my sisters chose Europe. One of my brothers chose South America. So we all went to different places but had the same kind of experience, where the education component firmly embedded in us the understanding of culture and industry and environment.

So I'd like you to talk a little bit more about what this polar school looks like. Are you seeing this as a Canadian institution? Or is there room for international involvement and it just happens to be housed in Canada? What's your view on that?

My daughter is a grade 3-4 teacher and she has just finished teaching a whole section on Arctic studies because of our taking the Arctic Council, and you're right, there's no curriculum. Is there room as well for your students who have gone on these expeditions to start creating curriculum that can be used in our public school system? Those are a lot of questions, I'm sorry.