The mining world finds itself at the intersection of multiple often contentious strands of federal government policy. It’s where the economic development, aboriginal communities, environmental protection and foreign assistance cross paths in sometimes conflicting ways.
This crossroads landscape comes into especially sharp focus at the annual Mecca of Canada’s extractive sector — the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada’s conference in Toronto, where stories from the front lines of one of the most fascinating industries can be heard.
To kick off our week-long coverage PDAC 2014, iPolitics.ca set out to explore some of the key issues facing miners today by bringing them to three experts in the sector.
From left to right as you see them in the thumbnails below, Guy Freedman is the founding partner and president of the First Peoples Group and a former employee with a mining company himself. He provides advice to companies and governments alike on how to work with aboriginal communities. The MacDonald Laurier Institute, led by Brian Crowley, is in the midst of research the intersection of aboriginal issues and Canada’s resource sector.
Finally, Lalith Gunaratne, owner of Sage Ontario for Mindful Leadership, has decades of experience working in international development.
Together they offer something of a crash course in some of the policy issues that will be driving discussions in Toronto.
To hear what each has to say on the five questions, click on their thumbnail. You can switch speakers at any time.
For the rest of this article and video interviews, click here: http://www.ipolitics.ca/2014/03/01/crossroad-policy-the-canadian-mining-industry-in-2014/