Time to Get Movin' on Post Beetle Ideas: One Man's Opinion

By Ben Meisner

Two things came out of the recent resource forum held in Prince George.

1. 1. The on going difficulty of mining companies to try and get necessary approvals to get their mines up and running and
2. 2.Just how little is being done to look ahead at, “ The day after the beetle epidemic”.

If we are going to diversify our economy to make up for the short fall coming after the forests take a tumble, we had better get our butts in gear.

That hasn’t happened.

Talk is cheap and that is what we have been served up with in large doses. The only people, who have a handle on the beetle question have been the FIrst Nations of the province led by Dan George.  They know what they need and have a plan being adopted. On the other side of the ledger we have several groups who say they are working on the problem, and while there is lots of money being spent, barely a trickle is coming out the end of the pipe.

The airport expansion is a good one, even if it only reaches 30% of its potential but that plan was on the books before the beetles came along and yet everyone seems to want to hang their hat on it.

One of the groups of exploration companies said last week, why aren’t you folks trying to snare all of the exploration companies into setting up shop in this city?  There are over 220 working in the region and if they all had offices here that would improve the labour climate.

But alas we are off in China and the Olympics returning I might add without even a candy wrapper to show for it.

If we are going to promote mining as the salvation for this region, let’s get moving! When you talk to the exploration and mining companies as they sat around listening to the supposed players in the region, they were saying, less talk, more action!

I’m Meisner and that’s one man’s opinion.   

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