Quebec promotes Plan Nord to international delegation

This Quebec government-led delegation includes Makivik Corp. and representatives from eight different countries, who are touring northern Quebec this week, including stops at La Grande hydro-electric complex, Chisasibi and Glencore’s Raglan mine. (PHOTO COURTESY OF MRI QUEBEC)

The government of Quebec is hosting an international delegation this week on a tour of northern Quebec — which includes a stop at Nunavik’s Raglan mine.

Quebec’s minister of international relations, Christine St-Pierre, and Aboriginal affairs minister Geoff Kelley, are leading the delegation of ambassadors and consuls general from the European Union and eight other counties on a two-day tour.

They arrive at Glencore’s Raglan mine Oct. 23. That’s when Makivik Corp. representatives plan to address them and share the corporation’s new Nunavik Inuit mining policy as well as details of Parnasimautik, the region’s blueprint for future development.

The tour is designed to promote the government’s Plan Nord and encourage investment in the province’s North in the face of a global mining market in decline.

That decline has impacted even Nunavik which saw little exploration activity during the last year.

A spokesperson for St-Pierre, Quebec’s minister of international relations, told the Quebec newspaper La Presse that the visiting delegation, which include Chinese and Russian officials, paid out of pocket to visit the region.

Before they arrived in Nunavik, the delegation members visited the La Grande hydro complex and the Cree community of Chisasibi on James Bay.

Ungava MNA Jean Boucher is also travelling with the group.