Northern BC Economy To Remain Stable

PRINCE GEORGE – Northern Development Initiatives Trust has released its annual “State of the North” economic update, looking at the past year in the region and a prediction of things to come this year.
The report found the economy in the resource sector has rebounded from its abysmal situation in 2014, when commodity prices took a nose dive.
“The data is clear that the decline in commodity prices in 2014 had a significant impact on the regional economy,” says Joel McKay, CEO for the NDIT. “The good news is that the data also shows that economic conditions in the region have stabilized more recently, and major project activity across the region has created opportunities for new investment.”
Those commodity price increases have resulted in some infrastructure investments, particularly in the mining and oil and gas sector. The wildcard is forestry. While the report has the industry trending upward, the forecast is a big question mark.
“Certainly there is and there’s a lot of anxiety marketplace. Not only around what’s going on with the Softwood Lumber Agreement with the United States, and some of the trade anxiety about where that’s going to go. But also we’re coming out of the salvage era of the Mountain Pine Beetle and that means the Annual Allowable Cut is going down in order for us to manage the forests sustainably over the next 509, 60, 100 years. We’re also seeing impacts from the spruce beetle, the fir beetle.”
But he adds, on the flip side, lumber prices are at record high levels. 
The report goes on to indicate employment remaining level, however, the unemployment rate remains higher than the BC average.