24 July 2020
(Yellowknife, NT – July 24, 2020) It is with regret that the NWT & Nunavut Chamber of Mines and its partner, the NWT Geological Survey, announce that the 2020 Geoscience Forum, held annually in November in Yellowknife, is cancelled.
Ongoing COVID-19 pandemic effects continue to stymy large public events and organizers have had to make the difficult decision to cancel the North’s largest combined tradeshow and conference. This is the first cancellation in the event’s 48-year history.
Organizers will continue to seek an alternative approach to share information on the North’s geoscience, its minerals industry, business opportunities with the minerals industry, and regulatory updates, that are of interest to so many in and outside of the Northwest Territories.
“This is an unfortunate circumstance that we find ourselves in, but we strive to develop communications alternatives for this year, and to plan for a strong conference return in 2021,” said Chamber of Mines President Ken Armstrong.
This is not the first of such northern events affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The Nunavut Mining Symposium 2020 was cancelled in March, and the NWT Tourism Association announced a one year postponement of its annual NWT Tourism Conference to November 2021. Many local businesses benefit from the large contingents of delegates that attend these and many other northern events. These cancellations compound the already significant financial struggles faced by local service providers, many of which are Chamber of Mines members.
For more information, please contact the NWT Geological Survey at ntgs@gov.nt.ca and/or contact Tom Hoefer, Executive Director of the Chamber of Mines, at executivedirector@miningnorth.com.