Thank you, Chair. I appreciate that.
Thanks also to the witnesses. We know how valuable your time is and we thank you very much for making time for us today.
Mr. Sohi, I'm going to direct a couple of questions to you, but I want to start with two quick points.
The first one is a thought about whom we compare ourselves to. Yes, Canadian oil is cleaner than other oil, but being cleaner and less bad than Saudi Arabia isn't good; it's just less bad. I think it's more instructive to compare ourselves to countries in the world that are leading in green and clean energy, like Iceland, Denmark, Scotland and so on. It's a smarter comparison for us to make in these times that we live in.
The other one is that Nate is actually from central Canada, not from the east, Mr. Steinley. I'm from the east, and I can tell you that it's a part of the world where, yes, fishers and coal miners have had to retrain. In the former case of the fisheries, it was the resource that collapsed; it wasn't government regulation. In the case of the latter, it was the economic viability of the extraction that no longer held, so those workers retooled and now they're providing for their families and contributing to their community in all kinds of productive and fulfilling ways.
We live in an era when there's so much work to do. We have to build a million houses in Canada. Perhaps it's that many. We have to build important green energy infrastructure. I just learned today about the Kivalliq hydro-fibre link in Manitoba to decarbonize the north by getting it off diesel. That's a major infrastructure project that's going to need people who understand energy infrastructure.
I wanted to make those two points.
Mr. Sohi, I have two questions. The first one is a very broad one. What do you believe is the gravest economic threat facing the prairie provinces today?