Indigenous Leaders: The successes and pitfalls of industry partnerships – by Ian Ross (Northern Ontario Business – April 6, 2022)

https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

Mining partners maintain good relationships and trust are ongoing processes

Fifty years ago, it was unheard of for mining companies to share the wealth and the benefits from their operations with Indigenous communities in Canada, much less be on speaking terms.

Times have dramatically changed with the massive need for ‘critical minerals’ to feed the emerging net-zero emissions economy. There’s the pressure for mining companies to find and develop deposits while meeting their obligations to build trust with Indigenous people.

Today, there are Aboriginal-owned corporations in the resource sector engaged with remote operations in Canada where sometimes 70 per cent of the workforce is Indigenous, remarked Ken Coates, a University of Saskatchewan researcher and moderator of a recent webinar hosted by the MacDonald-Laurier Institute.

The event, entitled Mining, Indigenous Communities and our Resource-Dependent Future, focused on the evolution of the relationships between Canadian mining companies and Indigenous people with case studies from northern Saskatchewan and northern Quebec.

For the rest of this article: https://www.northernontariobusiness.com/indigenous-leaders/indigenous-leaders-the-successes-and-pitfalls-of-industry-partnerships-5225059