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Arctic Yearbook 2014
A QUESTION
OF
FUTURE PROSPERITY: TRANSFORMING
NATURAL RESOURCE WEALTH INTO CITIZEN WELL BEING
THROUGH THE NORTHWEST TERRITORIES HERITAGE FUND
Sarah Daitch, Alyssa Schwann, Andrew Bauer, Andre Dias & Julia Fan Li
“Each generation will reap what the former generation has sown”
- Chinese Proverb
The Northwest Territories (NWT), Canada’s largest territory, holds significant natural resource potential, most of which is
undeveloped. Facing a potential resource boom in minerals, oil and gas, the territory’s government is considering how this finite
source of wealth can be harnessed as an engine for development and prosperity. On April 1, 2014 the Devolution Agreement
took effect, which transferred control of a portion of resource royalties from the federal Government of Canada to the territorial
Government of the Northwest Territories. In 2012, new legislation created a Heritage Fund for the territory, establishing the
world’s newest sub-national sovereign wealth fund. This fund aims to bank part of new resource revenues for future generations –
but, what governance measures and regulations will be required to ensure the Fund benefits citizens? In February 2014, several
authors of this paper co-published a policy report, A Question of Future Prosperity: Developing a Heritage Fund in
the Northwest Territories (Briones et al. 2014) outlining key recommendations for the Fund’s implementation. Members
of the Legislative Assembly tabled this report in the NWT Legislature, pressing the NWT Finance Minister to commit a higher
proportion of revenues to the Fund, a