Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to look at some of the smaller parts of this department, at least in terms of its relationship to our economy. The oil and gas and minerals side is enormous. Our economy is unfolding or pivoting on those resources. For the time being, though, they are, from a regulatory and a developmental point of view, largely out of our hands.

But what we do have almost absolute control of, Mr. Chairman, are the renewable kinds of resources and industries: tourism, forestry, furs, and fisheries, and arts and crafts, as we've just been debating. What we're reminded of once in a while, or we should be reminding ourselves once in a while, Mr. Chairman, is that unlike most other parts of Canada, the NWT does not have a federal investment program going for it to assist especially these aspects of our economy. They are especially important, Mr. Chairman, when you recognize that a diverse economy is a healthy one. I sometimes get a little concerned that so much of our economy and our values and things, the housing market and stuff that we see developing across the NWT is based on a surge in diamond and oil and gas activity. I'd really like to see more diversity. But we are handicapped, badly handicapped by the absence of this kind of agreement. I think the EDA kind of assistance programs with Ottawa that we're familiar with expired in 1996. So here we are almost seven years now without the advantage that something that the rest of Canada has had out there at their doorstep.

I guess that's enough of a preamble. I don't think I need to explain much more of where I'm going. I would like to ask the Minister what efforts does the department or the government foresee in the coming year that will help deliver something like a federal investment program for the NWT?