Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The Department of Resources, Wildlife and Economic Development has prepared its interim appropriation for the first four months of the 2000-2001 fiscal year. The $44 million requested in the appropriation represents approximately 60 percent of the departmental budget for last year.

Although many of the department's core business areas of capital and contracts are ones that must be expended at the beginning of the fiscal year, our forest management activity represents the most significant of these, with an allocation of $21 million. The only new initiative that the department has put forward in these requests is for development planning for the Liard and Mackenzie Valleys for $185,000. Mr. Chairman, that concludes my introductory remarks.