Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, for all of our contribution agreements within the Department of ITI, we always have a reporting mechanism, so yes.

Thank you. I'll go to the Member from Mackenzie Delta.

I'm fine. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from the Deh Cho.

Thank you, Mr. Chairperson. I was looking at the agriculture -- Canadian Agriculture Partnership. You had $1,051,000 in 2022-2023, and then you had nothing after that. Then it looks like you went into the Sustainable Canadian Agriculture Partnership. Okay, so do we have a huge agriculture sector in the Northwest Territories? Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I can honestly say that when I travelled to the South Slave not that long ago, agriculture was the topic that came up the most often when we were down there. So just for a summary of allocations to regions, if the Member is interested, from the SCAP allocations for 2023-2024, we had $230,000 to the Beau-Del; $120,000 to the Sahtu; $200,000 to the Deh Cho, $364,000 to the South Slave; $330,000 to the North Slave; and $340,000 to the headquarters region here for a total of 1.584 -- well, $1.5 million, just over. Thank you.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Deh Cho.

That's pretty -- it's growing. It's a grower sector that is becoming successful. So, yeah, that's what I wanted to know. How many people are -- or how many programs in -- so I'm trying to figure out what -- how many programs per region are there? Is it people are applying at every community, or is it certain communities? Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, I don't have a list that is community specific. But just to give an idea of some of the things that the funds are going toward, there are -- there's everything from research project to infrastructure investment, local markets, community-based growing initiatives, community garden wages, business plans, community planning processes, educational initiatives, school gardens, and even training events. So it's a real broad range of where people are investing in this market and this area. There's a ton of potential across the territory, especially in the Deh Cho region. And so there's real great opportunity. Even here based in Yellowknife, there is the agrifoods association who is also doing a lot of outreach and a lot of support to people from different regions to see how they can come together and really support one another, and this past year had their first conference here in town which was very well attended. This was even people from Europe that came over and presented that are growing another circumpolar regions. You know, even over in Alaska people came over here to talk about how they're doing it and what they're doing and even people from the Yukon. So there's a lot of opportunity and a lot of interest in food sustainability here in the Northwest Territories. Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the Member from the Deh Cho.

That's good. I'm happy to hear that. And that's a good news story from ITI supporting people and supporting the communities. So continue to do that because we're going to need a lot of that. So thank you so much. And that's it for questions.

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Member from Yellowknife North.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. So my first question is about Prosper NWT. And so it looks like the budget has been reduced by about 24 percent between last year's budget and this year's budget. Can the Minister explain what's happening there or the rationale behind that? Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. So, Mr. Chair, that was part of our fiscal sustainability reduction and our ask that Prosper NWT look at different options as to how to create more sustainability within the organization with less investment from the GNWT. And so I am working with Prosper NWT, with their board as well, to figure out what the future looks like and how they can continue to provide great service to businesses across the territory. Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the Member from Yellowknife North.

Okay, thank you for that. That's good to know. My next question is about the dramatic increase in economic diversification overall funding, and it looks like it's related to contract services. Can the Minister explain what in particular can be attributed to -- well, actually, it was an increase in last year's revised estimates that continued on to this year's main estimates. Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Mr. Chair, the primary driver of that is the Hay River fish plant. Thank you.

Thank you. I'll go to the Member from Yellowknife North.

Okay. And that is -- certainly, I think, fisheries are an important industry that we don't want to lose sight of. But probably a whole other conversation in and of itself that I won't get into now.

My next question, so the SEED program -- well, the first question -- I know that there's going to be an incorporation of arts funding all into ITI. Is the arts funding that used to be done through ECE all to come out of SEED funding, or is it coming out of somewhere else in this line? Thank you, Mr. Chair.