Conference Board creates northern research centre

The Conference Board of Canada has launched a "virtual centre for the north" that will produce $5 million worth of research on issues ranging from climate change to the northern economy.

The Conference Board's northern centre will back 50 major independent studies, to be produced over the next five years, on topics such as Canadian sovereignty, climate change, infrastructure, business opportunities and challenges, health and social development in the northern territories and the northern parts of the provinces.

The centre is "virtual" in that it doesn't include a physical presence in the North. The Conference's Board's offices are located in Ottawa.

"We feel that the issues and challenges facing the North right now are absolutely critical, not just for northern Canada, not just for the territories, but for all Canadians," Conference Board president Anne Golden told CBC News Thursday in Yellowknife, where the Centre for the North held its first meeting.

"It's important, though, to have an intelligent, fair-minded conversation about all of the many complicated issues."

At Thursday's meeting, Centre for the North investors reviewed the framework of the centre and determined the priority of research projects to be done in the year ahead.

Officials with the Conference Board, a non-profit research organization focusing on economic trends and public policy, say there often is not enough information that can be used to make decisions about the North.

'Key pressing issues'

"We're basically trying to get input from aboriginal communities, from business leaders, from government, to try and get a sense of what are the key pressing issues," said Pedro Antunes, the board's director of national and provincial forecast.

Antunes said the centre's main goal will be to encourage sustainable development in the North.

Golden said the 50 studies will give northerners, as well as those south of 60, a better understanding of the challenges people face in Canada's North.

She added that the research data will be helpful in implementing policies "to look at it from a balanced perspective: not just simply from a viewpoint of what is the way to maximize economic growth, but root it … in the whole theme of healthy communities."

The Conference Board will provide the Centre for the North with detailed economic forecasts for the North.