Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It has been a fact for some time that while many of our people, businesses and community-based organizations have done well in producing arts and crafts, we have not done a proper job in developing marketing strategies. We produce, but we do not spend enough time developing a way in which to sell to make sure that we have a market place to go to. People are going to accept the goods, reproduce and move them on to the consumers. We need to do more work in deciding what type of arts and crafts we need to produce and in what quantities, so that we are meeting the needs of consumers and tourists. We need to do more work so we know the volumes and the quality of work that is required to meet the needs of the consumers. We need to do more work in identifying the potential consumers and then alerting and making aware these potential consumers of the goods that we have available to us.
The NWT Development Corporation in the last year and a half has done considerable work just to shore-up the existing businesses we have across the territories to make sure they are running and operating in a manageable way. We are now turning our attention towards marketing. I have just come back from attending a conference in the United States, in Scottsdale, just outside of Phoenix, Arizona where we have brought producers of arts and crafts from all the aboriginal communities across Canada. The Northwest Territories was very well represented there under the organization of the Northwest Trading Company and the NWT Development Corporation and also with the involvement with the Cultural Institute. There we met with dealers, gallery owners and people from across the United States, who have a specific interest in becoming aware and acquiring carvings, paintings, arts and crafts from aboriginal communities. We think we have made a good start and a positive impact. We will know over the next couple of months whether this has been a good investment or not. Those are some of the examples of the things we are doing in regard to the concern to make sure as the market goes up and down that we continue to be diligent and trying to promote and maintain the markets that we have established to date. Thank you.