My thanks to your committee for inviting Cameco to share our knowledge and experience with regard to aboriginal education and employment.
Our company is headquartered in Saskatoon. Cameco is one of the world's largest producers of uranium for nuclear energy, accounting for 14% of global production. The majority of that production comes from our extensive mining and milling operations in northern Saskatchewan, which will be the focus of my presentation.
In producing our uranium products, Cameco employs more than 4,675 people in Canada between direct employment and long-term contractors. More than 1,500 of these jobs are held by workers of first nations or Métis heritage, making Cameco Canada's largest industrial employer of aboriginal people in Canada. We intend to continue to build on that achievement in the future. Our success in aboriginal employment has been accomplished through well-designed recruitment programs, training partnerships with governments and aboriginal agencies, accommodation by unions, and clear management policies.
As I mentioned, our mining and milling operations are in northern Saskatchewan. It's in a region called the northern administration district, which covers approximately half of Saskatchewan's land area, but has less than 4% of the population. Eight out of ten people in the region are of aboriginal descent. About half the population in the region does not have a grade 12 education, and just 25% of the region has post-secondary education. This is a serious challenge because our operations require a highly technical and skilled workforce. Ensuring aboriginal residents have the required secondary and post-secondary education to work in technical positions is an ongoing challenge for communities, government, and the company.
For Cameco, providing benefits such as well-paid employment to those most impacted by our operations is the right thing to do. More importantly, it makes business sense to recruit and develop a workforce from the young and predominantly aboriginal population who live in the region and not 700 kilometres away by air.
Cameco's corporate responsibility has five key pillars.
The workforce development pillar in particular has been key to our success in aboriginal employment. At two of our operations, we have full-time workplace educators who work in partnership with the regional college, Northlands College.The workplace educators provide GED and grade 12 upgrading and skills training to Cameco employees and contractors.
Externally, we work in partnership to help raise the skills level of people in the communities and get them prepared for employment. This has been addressed through a number of partnerships which have been effective. One example is the Northern Labour Market Committee and its subcommittee, the Mineral Sector Steering Committee, which manages the multi-party training plan. Currently in its fourth iteration, this training-to-employment initiative is realized through collaboration with industry, government, aboriginal agencies, and training institutions. Over its 21-year existence, the multi-party training plan has trained more than 3,000 northern residents for entry-level positions as well as technical trades and professional occupations in the mining industry.
Another successful partnership that Cameco supports is Northern Career Quest. This is a joint federal-provincial program. With industry support, it targets residents of northern Saskatchewan of aboriginal descent for training that leads directly to employment. Since its inception in 2008 it has played a critical role and is making a difference to this day.
There are several reasons that these partnerships are effective. When practical, the training is local or community based. Students are able to maintain family support and avoid the culture shock of moving to larger centres. Industry provides input on which occupations are in demand so that students taking training have a reasonable chance of gaining employment. Students also have the opportunity to do a work placement at one of our mine sites, so they learn the basics, from catching a plane to work, working a 12-hour shift, to building industry connections.
Communication is a foundation of our programs. We make repeated visits to elementary and high schools in all of our stakeholder communities. We have five community liaisons that are available in our communities most impacted by our mine sites. As well, we use social media such as Facebook as young aboriginal people are tuned into that forum. We have the regular programs, such as summer students and scholarship programs, which are effective at getting people in the door.
All of these things help, but we're not shy in stating that preferential hiring policies for qualified northern residents is a primary driver for our success in achieving aboriginal and northern employment. Qualified northern candidates are hired over others outside the region. It's important to note this is not a soft goal. This is a rule documented within our corporate recruitment policy, as well as with formal agreements with the Province of Saskatchewan. This pushes accountability and consistency.
We also have career transition programs, trades apprenticeships, formal job progressions, and career planning programs for aboriginal employees. As well, our work sites are designed to reduce barriers to aboriginal people. Our work schedule is one week at work and one week off. This allows aboriginal people to reside in their home community and maintain the traditional lifestyle if they choose. We have 13 aircraft pick-up points throughout northern Saskatchewan, which addresses the isolation and remoteness of communities. We have excellent communication services on site, including cellular service and Internet. This allows employees to remain in contact with family, which is important to aboriginal people.
I'd like to mention that Cameco takes our commitment to local and aboriginal employment very seriously. Nevertheless, industry can only do so much to build on the foundation of our success. We know there are many challenges in our stakeholder communities. Despite these challenges, northern Saskatchewan has demonstrated the benefits to be gained when industry has a voice in helping shape adult training programs. As I said, these training programs are an essential entry point for hundreds of northern people into our workforce of aboriginal people. We do see—