NADC Area Profile: An Economic Description of the Region May 2016 Prepared by Northern Alberta Development Council (NADC) 206 Provincial Building, Bag 900-14 Peace River, AB T8S 1T4 www.nadc.ca Edmonton | Fort McMurray | Bonnyville | Peace River EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 1 REGION 4 POPULATION (2011 CENSUS) 8 LABOUR FORCE (2011 NHS) 14 LOCAL ECONOMY 18 INDUSTRY MIX 18 ENERGY AND MINERALS 19 AGRICULTURE, 2011 CENSUS 21 FORESTRY PRODUCTS 24 TOURISM 27 DEVELOPMENT POLICIES 28 DEVELOPMENT ISSUES 31 REFERENCE 33 APPENDIX 1 – MUNICIPAL AUTHORITIES AND THEIR COMMUNITIES 36 APPENDIX 2 – RESERVES/SETTLEMENTS/VILLAGES AND FIRST NATIONS 38 APPENDIX 3 – ELECTORAL AREA, ALBERTA 40 FEDERAL ELECTORAL DISTRICT (NADC REGION) 40 PROVINCIAL ELECTORAL DIVISIONS (NADC REGION) 40 APPENDIX 4 – GEOGRAPHICAL UNITS (SGC 2011) 41 CD 12 (COLD LAKE CA) 41 CD 13 41 CD 16 (WOOD BUFFALO CA) 41 CD 17 41 CD 18 42 CD 19 (GRANDE PRAIRIE CA) 42 APPENDIX 5 – LABOUR, 2011 NHS 43 APPENDIX 6 – 2011 CENSUS AGRICULTURAL REGIONS 45 Northern Development is an opportunity and a challenge to build a prosperous, entrepreneurial, and diversified economy for our northern urban, rural, and remote residents. Executive Summary Profiling a local economy is one of the key economic analysis tools for economic development planning. An area profile provides a fundamental description of a region’s economy – its system or range of activities related to the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services – which serves as a basis or starting point for other regional economic analyses. An area profile may inform investors and entrepreneurs to consider business opportunities in the region, attract visitors, and brief the citizenry and governments on the structure, state, developments, and outlook of the local economy. It may serve to identify data gaps and areas of research that are relevant in order to understand and address socio-economic issues and to provide information for public policy development. Northern development is an opportunity and a challenge for a region that is vast, sparse in population, and abundant in natural resources. Public policy intervention is important in realizing economic development in northern Alberta. Public infrastructure, for instance, is of prime importance for relatively small and remote communities to sustain and thrive as health and social services are made available through publicly funded schools, hospitals, clinics, roads, recreational facilities, and others. These communities contribute to maintaining vital linkages in the supply chain and stewardship of natural resources. Public infrastructures also provide economic growth and opportunity as it open doors for new or improved access to trading corridors, alternative destinations for visitors, and linkages between and among northern communities. Regional economies promote diversity and dispersion of economic activities across the province. Recognizing and addressing regional challenges are necessary to foster resilient communities and robust local economies particularly in northern Alberta. 1 | NADC The NADC region is vast, covering a land area The National Household Survey in 2011 showed that is about 60% of the province’s total land that the labour participation in the region is area. Its natural region is largely Boreal Forest relatively high at 74.1%, with employment rate with pockets of Canadian Shield in the northeast at 70.0% and unemployment rate at 5.6%. corner of the region, Rocky Mountain in the While most of the region’s labour force are southwest corner, Foothills in the lower employees – about 86%, 13.1% are self- southwest, and a relatively small portion of employed. Parkland in the west and southeast corner. Significant concentration of the labour force are The region is largely rural area with pockets of in occupational groups related to trades, urban areas. There are 26 municipal authorities transport and equipment operators; sales and some with towns, villages, and hamlets. All services; management; and, business, finance, eight Métis settlements in the province are within and administration. About 15.4% of the region’s the region in addition to 112 First Nation labour force work in the Mining, quarrying, and reserves that is home to 32 First Nations. Treaty oil and gas extraction industry. The Construction 6, 8, and 10 are treaty areas within the region. and Retail Trade industries each have about 10% of the region’s labour force. From a statistical standpoint, the region consists of Census Division (CD) 16, 17, 18, 19, with There is significant disparity in income across the portions of CDs 12 and 13. The NADC region has region with the Wood Buffalo area standing out two Economic Regions (ERs), namely: of the rest in the region. Median income in the Athabasca-Grande Prairie-Peace River ER, which Wood Buffalo area (CD 16) is 89.1% higher than consists of CD 13, 17, 18, and 19; and, Wood the province. Buffalo-Cold Lake ER, which consists of CD 12 and 16. There were 48,760 businesses operating in the region in 2014 with minimum annual revenue of The NADC region is home to about 386,000 $30,000. Notable industries in the region people – about 10.6% of Alberta’s population in include: Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing and 2011. The region’s population is relatively young Hunting; Construction; Real Estate and Rental with the median age in the range of 29.4 years and Leasing; and, Transportation and old to 41.3 years old. Largely for the region, the Warehousing. About 60.5% of businesses in the projected average annual growth is in the range region are considered micro-businesses – those of 0.01% to 0.99%. Although for the Grande with less than five employees. Prairie area, its population growth is expected to grow faster than the provincial average, which is The NADC region has abundant natural resources comparable to population growth in the areas of dominated by oil resources, natural gas, Calgary, Red Deer, and Edmonton. agricultural land, and forestry products. All of Alberta’s oil sands resources are located in three The region has a diverse ethnic population with areas within the NADC region – Athabasca, Cold identified groups numbering 33 to 102 in a CD Lake, and Peace River. Conventional gas fields within the region. In 2011, the visible minority in the region are located in the region’s population totaled 23,010. Top groups include: northwest corner (Grande Cache and Grande Filipinos, South Asians, Arabs, Latin Americans, Prairie area) as well as in the eastern half of the Blacks, and Chinese. province from Fort McMurray area down to the Medicine Hat area. In the same year, there were 26,870 immigrants in the NADC region. Top source countries of About 8,361 farms or 19.3% of farms in the immigrants include: UK, US, Germany, province are located within the NADC region. Netherlands, India, Philippines, Pakistan, Mexico, About 62.2% of these farms are sole South Africa, and Turkey. proprietorship. About 45.6% or 3,816 farms in the region are located in the Upper Peace area. Farm sizes in the region range from under 10 contribution and diversity to economic activities acres to 3,520 acres and over. in the province. Most farms in the region produced organic field The NADC region, like other regions in the crops and animals or animal products. Among province, is impacted by government policies and the variety of field crops include wheat (spring, programs. Critical to the region are capital durum, and winter), oats, barley, fall rye, alfalfa, investments made by the government to support canola, flaxseed, and dry field peas. The region the delivery of public services, market access, also has its share of poultry and egg production, and the fostering of business opportunities and cattle, pigs, sheep and lamb, bees, and other development among relatively small, rural and livestock such as horses and ponies, goats, wild urban communities that are spread throughout boar, bison (buffalo), mink, rabbits, deer, elk, the vast region in northern Alberta. llamas, and alpacas. The challenges of sustaining economic activity Total gross farm receipts from farms in the with the necessity to address social, region amounted to about $1.25B or 10.9% of environmental, and ecological concerns remain a the province’s total. Farms in the Upper Peace critical consideration in formulating public policy region accounted for about 55.2% or $0.69B of that impacts the socio-economic development of the region’s gross farm receipts. the NADC region. Alberta’s forest of 38M hectares is mostly in Aside from the fiscal policy of the government – northern Alberta. From this resource, forestry both provincial and municipal, other public policy products such as panels and engineered wood initiatives important to the NADC region include products, lumber, pulp and newsprint, among the Land-Use Framework, Municipal Government others, generated about $29M in exports in 2014 Act, royalty review, workforce strategy and with revenues from goods manufactured in 2012 immigration, trade agreements, climate or totaling about $5.35B. environmental policies, and social policies. Harvesting of forestry resources covered an area As part of its mandate, the NADC has released of 87,578 Ha in 2013 with a total volume of two position papers on the economic 22.8M cubic metres. Regeneration efforts in the development of northern Alberta – one in 1977 same year include 751 Ha of seeded area and and another in 1991. While 15 years apart, it is 70,016 Ha of planted area. evident that the economic potential of abundant natural resources is well recognized, as well as The forestry products industry also dealt with the economic disparity that exists within the insect defoliation in 2013 that covers an area of region and between northern communities and 8.7M Ha and 1,451 forest fires covering an area elsewhere in the province. of 23,120 Ha the following year.