Positive Economic Atmosphere In NW Ontario
by Scott A. Sumner
It was fun to attend the recent economic development conference, NEEGANII- IISHAWIN Gathering 2026, held at the Nor'Wester Hotel in Thunder Bay,Ontario. It featured Indigenous economic development officers from the 36 communities that they serve.
I grew up in the small town of Manitouwadge Ontario, which was a mining community. I am quite familiar with living in these smaller communities and how the major industries affect the people that lived there.
My father was a mining engineer and moved to Manitouwadge fairly on in his career. It was very evident how important mining was in Northwestern Ontario, Canada and the world. I always remember going with my father to visit the mine development site at Hemlo in 1984 when all there was there were core samples on the ground from exploration activities. This resulted in three operating mines that produced billions in economic activity.
We are currently going through a very prominent mining resurgence in North Northwestern Ontario in this area. It was nice talking to Steve Lines about the First Gold Mining project located north of Sioux Lookout, Ontario. The magnitude and complexity to produce an operating gold mine like this over a number of years is impressive. The billion dollar plus investment, along with all the regulatory steps that need to be taken place was very, very informative and it shows the resilience of people to achieve a complex goal.
Also, it was very nice chatting with them with the John D. Beardy from Windigo company who was involved in the creation of this economic development conference. He is definitely interested in creating the environment for his 36 communities to create economic opportunities for their members. On average about 1000 people live in each of the communities so we're really almost reaching a community of 40,000 people located to the north of Thunder Bay. The opportunity to improve the quality of life of these communities is great with things such as more road access, better electricity access, and jobs for the members. There are also great business opportunities available to service the new mining operations and forestry operations.
We live in an exciting time in Northwest Ontario, as our vast resources are definitely required by others in this massive world of 8 billion people. It will be very interesting to see how many of these projects progress over the years.
