I wanted to follow up on some of the discussion that has been happening.
I think we have to look at a multi-faceted approach. It's not just starting up businesses; we have to take a look at everything, from early childhood development to speaking for Inuit communities on the high rate of teenage pregnancy and sometimes the parenting that's involved in supporting a young teenage mom, which may fall to the grandmother or to the elder. There are real reasons why some of these factors are happening. So it's a multi-faceted approach.
Our Inuit Women in Business initiative at Pauktuutit takes a look at business development programs that are already out there. Inuit women aren't accessing them at the community level, and we address those gaps. Day one of the workshop is taking a look at whether you want to be an entrepreneur or not and what that entails. Some people will finish the workshop and go on to start their business. Other people will not want to do it, as it takes five years to get a successful business going, but they may want to go back to school.
We have to take a look at the housing crisis and infrastructure, or if women want to be involved in the economy but the day care shuts down because the building doesn't meet safety standards. These are the kinds of things we have to look at. Or if the day care wants to serve country food, and many of our people depend on country food, but it might not be allowed in the day care because it has to be flown to Toronto to get safety inspected, depending on which Inuit community it is. I would say to the committee that we need to address it with a multi-faceted approach.
When we speak in terms of the Status of Women, right now Pauktuutit is working on culturally relevant models to address abuse in the way that communities see it to reduce the incidents of violence in our communities and the tolerance of it.