CCAB Announces More Achievements in Progressive Aboriginal Relations Program22 February 2006
The Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business (CCAB) will honour a record nine corporations as leaders in working with the fast-growing Aboriginal sector of the Canadian economy. The ceremony will be part of the Eighth Annual CCAB Circle for 2015 Gala Dinner in Toronto tonight.
The dinner is being co-chaired by Gord Nixon, President and CEO of RBC Financial Group and Doug Lord, President, Chairman and CEO of Xerox Canada. The 2006 laureates to the Aboriginal Business Hall of Fame will also be inducted at the sold-out dinner, which brings together nearly 500 leaders of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal businesses from across Canada.
The nine companies to be recognized for demonstrating leadership in the Progressive Aboriginal Relations (PAR) are:
- Alberta-Pacific Forest Industries - Boyle, Alberta - Gold Achievement
- Xerox Canada - Toronto, Ontario - Gold Achievement
- Syncrude Canada - Fort McMurray, Alberta - Gold Achievement, 2002,
renewed 2004, 2006
- Manitoba Lotteries Corporation - Winnipeg, Manitoba - Silver
Achievement
- Operations Division, Canada Post Corporation - Ottawa, Ontario -
Silver Achievement
- Western Lakota Energy Services Ltd. - Calgary, Alberta - Silver
Achievement
- IBM Canada - Markham, Ontario - Bronze Achievement
- Pitblado Barristers & Solicitors - Winnipeg, Manitoba - Bronze
Achievement
- World Wildlife Fund, Canada -- Toronto, Ontario - Bronze Achievement
"The companies in PAR are making a significant contribution to the prosperity of Aboriginal Canadians," said CCAB President and CEO Jocelyne Soulodre. "They are showing leadership in employment, business development, individual capacity development and community relations - the four sectors that PAR examines," she said.
PAR provides a framework for businesses and other organizations to self-assess their approach to the emerging Aboriginal marketplace and tools to help them improve their performance. PAR is a long-term process that will allow participating companies to expand their knowledge of and interaction with the Aboriginal community. See the PAR section at www.ccab.com for more information.
The following organizations have also achieved advanced standing in PAR:
- BMO Bank of Montreal - Toronto, Ontario - Gold Achievement, 2004
- Cameco Corporation - Saskatoon, Saskatchewan - Gold Achievement, 2002,
renewed 2005
- Diavik Diamond Mines Inc. - Lac De Gras, Northwest Territories - Gold
Achievement, 2005
- ESS Support Services - Burnaby, B.C. - Gold Achievement, 2005
- Place Louis Riel All-Suite Hotel - Winnipeg, Manitoba - Gold
Achievement, 2003
- Remote Sites Division, Sodexho - Montreal, Québec - Gold Achievement -
2003, renewed 2005
- Donna Cona - Ottawa, Ontario - Silver Achievement, 2001
- Scotiabank - Toronto, Ontario - Silver Achievement, 2005
- Nasittuq Corporation - Ottawa, Ontario - Bronze Achievement, 2005
Eight companies are in the program at the Commitment, or initial, level:
- Delta Bessborough Hotel, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
- EDS Canada, Oshawa, Ontario
- Global Television - Toronto, Ontario
- Higgins International - Winnipeg, Manitoba
- Radisson Hotel Winnipeg Downtown - Winnipeg, Manitoba
- Red River College - Winnipeg, Manitoba
- SaskTel - Regina, Saskatchewan
- Tribal Council Investment Group - Winnipeg, Manitoba
CCAB is the country's leading organization dedicated to promoting the full participation of Aboriginal communities in the Canadian economy. CCAB's mission is to connect Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people and companies with the opportunities they require to achieve personal and business success.
Welland Woman, Inuvik Man Named to CCAB Aboriginal Business Hall of Fame
Suzanne Rochon Burnett and Fred Carmichael
Honoured for Lifetime Achievements
The Canadian Council for Aboriginal Business (CCAB) today announced that Mr. Fred Carmichael of Inuvik, NT and Madame Suzanne Rochon Burnett of Welland, ON are being honoured for their lifetime contribution to Aboriginal business in Canada as the second group of laureates to be named to the CCAB Aboriginal Business Hall of Fame (ABHF).
Mr. Carmichael, a long-time commercial pilot and air service and tourism operator, is now the President of the Gwich'in Tribal Council and Chair of the Aboriginal Pipeline Group, a partner in the proposed Mackenzie Valley pipeline project.
Madame Rochon Burnett, O.C., O.Ont., a long-time promoter of Aboriginal artists and the first Aboriginal person to hold two private broadcasting licenses, is the President of Kakekalanicks Inc. and the former owner and operator of Welland's Spirit 91.7 FM.
The first laureates, named in 2005, were Dr. Billy "Chief" Diamond, a northern Québec Cree and Mr. Irvin Goodon, a Métis from Boissevain, MB.
The ABHF is sponsored by ESS Support Services, a division of Compass Group Canada. The ABHF was created by CCAB in 2004 to mark their 20th year of operations.
In addition to paying tribute to outstanding business leaders of the past and the present, the ABHF serves as an example of excellence for young Aboriginal people thinking about a career in business. The ABHF can be viewed at the CCAB website at www.ccab.com/leaders.htm. Pages devoted to Mr. Carmichael and Madame Rochon Burnett will be posted following the induction ceremony.
The ceremony will take place on Tuesday, February 21 at the eighth annual CCAB Circle for 2015 Annual Gala Dinner at Toronto's Four Seasons Hotel. The dinner, highlighting the successes of Canadian Aboriginal business, is sold out. Over 450 senior Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal business leaders will be attending.
The ABHF selection committee, chaired by Mr. Peter Godsoe, former Chairman and CEO of Scotiabank, met recently in Toronto to consider the 2005/06 nominations.
"We were pleased to see the large number of highly qualified nominees from right across the country," said Mr. Godsoe. "It was not easy to narrow down the choice from so many outstanding individuals, but after much discussion and reflection, we decided Fred and Suzanne were at the top of the list for this year," he said.
"Fred and Suzanne are remarkable business people and distinguished Canadians. Their stories deserve to be better known by everyone," said CCAB President and CEO Jocelyne Soulodre. "They provide a special inspiration to the many Aboriginal Canadians who are playing an increasingly vital role in the economy."
"As a company active in Aboriginal communities across Canada, ESS knows these names well," said Jack MacDonald, CEO of Compass Group Canada. "We think honouring men and women of such stature is long overdue and we are proud to be helping to spread the word."
ESS, a division of Compass Group Canada, is the market leader in providing complete camp services to operations in remote and offshore locations, wherever their location may be, no matter how extreme the environment may be. ESS employs nearly 1000 associates in 136 operating units across Canada.
CCAB is Canada's leading organization dedicated to promoting the full participation of Aboriginal communities in the Canadian economy. CCAB's mission is to connect Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal people and companies with the opportunities they require to achieve personal and business success. Find out more at www.ccab.com.
Fred Carmichael biographical note
Fred Carmichael has made his mark as a businessman on the ground and in the air.
He was born in 1935 in Canada's far North, in the isolated Arctic hamlet of Aklavik in the Mackenzie River delta.
His future flew into view when he was twelve. A little red Stinson landed at their cabin on the trap line. The pilot let Freddie look over the cockpit and he was awestruck. Five years later he managed to get a ride in another Stinson and he was hooked for good.
A few years later Fred wrote himself into history as the first Aboriginal pilot in the North to have both a commercial pilot's license and a charter license. He started Reindeer Air Services - when he sold it, Reindeer had 15 planes, including C-46s and -47s.
In 1982 he started Antler Air, which grew into the 15-plane Western Arctic Air.
He has now flown for fifty years without a single accident, and still holds a commercial pilot's license.
He was elected President of the Gwich'in Tribal Council in 2000 and appointed chair of the Aboriginal Pipeline Group in 2002.
Fred is committed to helping the Gwich'in people seize control of their economic destiny by using the project as their passport to the future. APG owns one-third of the project on behalf of the Aboriginal communities of the Valley. It will earn one-third of the profits once the gas starts to flow.
He believes the pipeline will help his people to regain the pride and independence he remembers in his ancestors by restoring their economic self-sufficiency.
Suzanne Rochon Burnett, O.C., O.Ont., biographical note
Suzanne Rochon Burnett has been a leader in the Métis business revival of the past few decades.
Born in 1935 in Ste. Adele, Québec, Suzanne attended a local convent school before attending business college in the Laurentians.
She got a job at a new radio station in St. Jerome after she graduated. The nuns at her convent school had emphasized diction and enunciation - her perfect French got her on the air as a reporter.
Soon Suzy became a model, then the face of the Montreal Royals baseball club and a regular on television, while continuing her radio work. She became a one-woman public relations powerhouse before PR became a familiar term.
By the early '60s, she decided to do something different. She converted an old Laurentian lodge to a successful auberge and art gallery. A few years later she married and sold the business and moved with her husband to Ontario. Then Suzanne took a break from her career to raise her daughter.
Soon she decided to return to broadcasting and developed a radio show about French artists that was syndicated to over 20 stations across Ontario. She became a regular on CBC's Morningside radio show.
Always passionate about the arts and business, in the mid '80s Suzanne founded a company to market Aboriginal artists. She later served on the board of the Canada Council.
In 1995, she purchased the assets of an almost bankrupt AM radio station in Welland. After a two-year fight, she was granted an FM license and launched SPIRIT 91.7, a country station that soared in the ratings in southern Ontario and western New York. She was the first Aboriginal person to own a private, commercial radio station in Canada. Her deteriorating health forced her to sell the station in 2004 and she is now retired in Welland.
For further information: CCAB: Jocelyne Soulodre, 416-961-8663 ext. 225, jsoulodre@ccab.com, (416) 961-8663 ext. 235, jsoulodre@ccab.com; ESS Support Services: Brenda Brown (905) 568-4636 ext. 418, brenda.brown@compass-canada.com
Source: newswire
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