CANADIAN RELOCATION
NORTHWEST TERRITORIES PROFILE

Northwest Territories: Population January 1, 2014, 43,641 people; Area: 589,300 square miles (1,526,300 square km).

Northwest Territories region of northern and northwestern Canada, encompassing a vast area of forests and tundra. Throughout most of the 20th century the territories constituted more than a third of the area of Canada, and they reached almost from the eastern to the western extremities of the country across the roof of the North American continent. The creation in 1999 of the territory of Nunavut out of the eastern portion of the Northwest Territories reduced the area of the latter by more than half. The capital and largest town is Yellowknife.

The winters are long and cold, with an average mean January reading at Yellowknife, on the northern shore of Great Slave Lake, of -18º F (-28º C). With only about 70 frost-free days, the growing season is short. While it lasts, however, wildflowers and grasses flourish, and root and cereal crops can be cultivated. Many species of valuable fur-bearing animals are found in the area, notably muskrat and beaver. Moose, wolves, black and grizzly bears, and mountain sheep and goats are also native. Pickerel, northern pike, and whitefish inhabit the rivers and lakes.

High production costs and transportation problems inhibit development of many of the territories' mineral resources, including the petroleum and natural gas fields that exist in the western Arctic coastal regions.

Government assistance in the development of major resources has been provided mainly in the form of roads, electric-power facilities, mapping, and geologic services, although the government has participated in the search for oil and natural gas. Government agencies produce and distribute electric power throughout the territories and provide certain transportation services.

Mining has been the principal nonrenewable resource industry of the territories. Gold has been mined at Yellowknife on the north shore of Great Slave Lake since the late 1930s. Silver, copper, tungsten, and cadmium are among the metals that have been produced.

Petroleum fuels for use in the territories are obtained from refineries located at the Norman Wells and Pointed Mountain fields. Gasoline and diesel fuel are important both for transportation and for electric power generating purposes. Large-scale hydroelectric power development has not been feasible, but a number of small sites have been developed.

Trapping continues to provide income for some of the native population. Muskrat, beaver, marten, mink, and lynx are the most important furs taken in the Mackenzie area, while the Arctic fox remains the principal fur in the Arctic regions.

Fishing and hunting of sea mammals also provides some employment. Whitefish and lake trout are fished commercially on Great Slave and some smaller lakes. Seals and small whales are hunted for food, and some sealskins are marketed commercially. Sport fishing and hunting are major attractions for the small but growing number of tourists who visit each year.

The Fort Smith region has most of the 200,000 square miles of forested land, but even there, large stands of marketable timber are not plentiful. The several sawmills process the timber only for local use.

Although there are vast areas of arable land, farming is not profitable. Some field crops are grown for local use, but most foodstuffs must be imported from the outside, greatly affecting their price.

Nearly all passenger and much freight traffic is carried by air services. Flights link Yellowknife and other major settlements along the Mackenzie valley to Edmonton, Alberta. Surface transportation for heavy freight is mainly by water. The Northern Transportation Company Limited is the principal carrier on the Mackenzie River waterway. The waterway is supplemented in the southern part of the Fort Smith region by the Mackenzie Highway and a railway connecting Hay River and Pine Point to the trans-Canada rail systems at Grimshaw, Alberta.

The southern Mackenzie valley is linked by a highway from Fort Simpson to the Alaska highway system in Yukon, while to the north the Mackenzie delta is connected to Dawson, in Yukon, by the Dempster Highway. Tractor trains and other overland vehicles using temporary winter roadways carry freight into remote areas. Snowmobiles are used for light winter travel.

Ultimate constitutional responsibility for government in the territories rests with the federal government in Ottawa, but most provincial responsibilities have been delegated to a territorial administration sitting at Yellowknife. This consists of a commissioner and a Legislative Assembly comprising 14 members elected by the people to serve a four-year term. The elected council reflects the distinct ethnic mix of the territorial population.

The council generally convenes during the winter, spring, and fall. During these sessions the council has the authority to enact legislation on most territorial matters. The territories are represented by one elected member in the Canadian Parliament. Justice is dispensed by a territorial court, a police magistrate, and several justices of the peace. Law enforcement is carried out by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The federal government controls all natural resources except game and administers them through its Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.

Missionaries provided nearly all the education and health care available in the territories until the 1950s, but since then both have become mainly government responsibilities. The federal Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development cooperates with the territorial department of education in providing elementary and secondary schooling and in assisting native students to pursue postsecondary education outside the territories.

A number of postsecondary programs and courses are offered by a community college system at several centres throughout the territories.

Health care is provided through comprehensive territorial hospital and medical-services insurance plans.

Modern forms of transportation and communication have done much to break down the isolation of life in the north, and contemporary North American popular culture is evident in most communities.

Satellite television has made a wide range of entertainment and educational programs available to viewers in even the most remote settlements.

Radio stations relay programs throughout the territories, and most of the larger settlements have their own weekly newspapers. Some even have local television stations that originate programs for distribution in the territories.

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