Labrador, land of plenty

In desperate economic times — and Newfoundland had its share leading up to Confederation with Canada in 1949 — Labrador was put on the block. During one such attempted sale, in 1924, Newfoundland offered Labrador to Quebec for $30 million, although the already fire-sale price was cut in half before year’s end.

The deal had its opponents, including Dr. Wilfred Grenfell, a prominent medical missionary based on the tip of Newfoundland’s Northern Peninsula, who condemned the proposed sale as short sighted. Grenfell argued that Labrador was resource rich, and Newfoundland would be blind to its own interests if it parted with Labrador for cash.

Grenfell was dead on the money.

It was also incredibly fortuitous for Newfoundland that Quebec decided to walk away from the proposed sale. Eighty-six years later and Labrador’s incredible resource wealth helps drive the provincial economy, one of Canada’s hottest.

Newfoundland and Labrador achieved have status in the fall of 2008 (the first time since Confederation), and while offshore oil was a primary factor in the reversal of economic fortune, Labrador’s economy has been a bright spot for years.

That said, the recent worldwide recession hit Labrador’s resource-based economy hard. In 2009, the value of provincial mineral shipments (primarily from Labrador) decreased about 50 per cent to $1.9 billion, due to lower production and a severe drop in price for iron ore and nickel, according to provincial budget documents.

This year, however, the Danny Williams administration expects the value of mineral shipments to increase about 60 per cent to $3.1 billion as the result of higher production and healthier prices for iron ore, nickel and copper.

“This is Labrador’s time,” said former Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Brian Tobin, in an address earlier this summer to Expo Labrador 2010 in Happy Valley-Goose Bay. Tobin is executive chairman of Consolidated Thompson, which operates a new iron ore mine and mill at Bloom Lake, Que. near the Labrador border.

“There is nothing dreamlike in this, the potential for Labrador is unlimited,” said Tobin, who grew up in Labrador, graduating from Robert Leckie High School in Goose Bay. “This is still a land of opportunity and a place that should attract significant capital and create new jobs.”

Indeed, the Labrador West economy has run so hot in recent months that international workers have been brought in from countries such as the Philippines to fill service-industry jobs at businesses like Tim Hortons. Labrador’s economy is thriving on the mines of Labrador West (“the iron-ore capital of the world”), where the unemployment rate is practically zero

“Labrador West is going to be the Fort McMurray of the East,” says Labrador Affairs Minister John Hickey.

The economy of Lake Melville/Happy Valley-Goose Bay, a hub in terms of government, health, and transportation services, is equally as robust, he says. “One thing I don’t have to worry about as an MHA is people coming to me looking for a work. Anybody who wants a job can work.

Hickey takes the boast a step further: “The future of this province lies in the development of the resources of Labrador,” he says.

That kind of thinking began when the Williams government took power in the fall of 2003. “For far too long, the people, resources and potential of Labrador have been ignored and excluded from decision making processes of the province,” read the Progressive Conservative book of pre-election promises. “We can no longer tolerate this atmosphere of exclusion, and we must recognize that Labrador will play a pivotal role in the future success of this province.”

Seven years after taking office, the Williams administration has two Labrador cabinet ministers (there were none in 2003; Patty Pottle holds the other portfolio of Aboriginal Affairs). Further, Hickey says the current Tory government has invested $2.4 billion in Labrador since day one, “an investment never seen before in Labrador’s history.”

Often referred to as the Big Land, Labrador has a huge landmass of just over 294,000 square kilometres, large enough to fit the three Maritime provinces and the island of Newfoundland within its boundaries. But Labrador’s population stands at only 28,000, with about 10,000 people in Labrador West, another 10,000 in the Lake Melville/Happy Valley-Goose Bay area, and the other 8,000 scattered in northern Labrador and along the coast.