Photo: Rankin Inlet, place of opportunity

Pujjuut Kusugak, the mayor of Rankin Inlet, speaking at the Nunavut Mining Symposium April 7 in Iqaluit. Kusugak said Rankin Inlet, where Agnico-Eagle’s Meliadine gold mine is now eagerly awaited, is “a place of opportunity” because of its geographic location and its entrepreneurial population. He predicted that the Meliadine gold mine could add between 400 and 600 people to Rankin’s current population, which now stands at around 2,800. (PHOTO BY JIM BELL)