Canadian mining firms fear ability to meet soaring demand as jobs crisis stalks land of the Big Nickel

November 5 – ‘People love to jump in their cars, use their cell phones and Xboxes and jump on light rail, but they don’t understand the minerals and metals that go into that, says Ryan Montpellier, a leading mining sector executive in Canada.
“Even those young people that do have an awareness continue to hold very dated perceptions of our industry. They still view this as a dark, dirty and dangerous industry, and that couldn’t be further from the truth,” he says.

The image of mining involving use of archaic tools, being unsafe and not taking the environment into account does not reflect Canada’s modern mining industry , he adds.

Montpellier is executive director of Canada’s Mining Industry Human Resources Council, opens new tab (MiHR), a non-profit that is working with leading mining companies to address labour shortages in the minerals and metals sector.

Last year, MIHR received more than C$15 million from the federal government as part of a multi-stakeholder initiative to attract, recruit and develop a diverse and skilled mining workforce.

Its research shows that two-thirds of young Canadians, opens new tab would not consider working in the sector, and declining enrolment in mining training courses is leaving companies scrambling to fill 10,000 vacancies amid an unprecedented boom in demand for its products, which are used in everything from solar panels to semiconductors, wind turbines to advanced batteries for energy storage and electric vehicles.

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Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) annual conference in Toronto

People view a display at the booth of a lithium resource and technology company at the Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) annual conference in Toronto, Ontario, Canada March 7, 2023. REUTERS/Chris Helgren Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

Canada’s mining sector is one of the biggest in the world. It employs about 200,000 people directly, and another 100,000 indirectly, and is present in more than 100 countries, with a combined market capitalisation of C$520 billion. So the skills gap has implications for the entire energy transition.
Jered Heigh, director of talent acquisition and development at uranium miner Cameco, says: “If we don’t figure out a way to solve this (labour gap), we are going to have mining companies in Canada and across the world that are going to have to cut production – and that could impact everything from availability to the price of mined commodities.”

Nadia Mykytczuk, executive director at Laurentian University’s Goodman School of Mnes in Sudbury, Ontario, says the country will need 15 new mines and 19 processing facilities over the next 20 years to meet demand of manufacturers planning four new EV battery factories in Canada.

“Shortages are a very real risk and everyone in the industry is talking about it and recognises it,” Mykytczuk says.

She points out that the industry’s outdated reputation for grim, dirty and dangerous work is compounded by collective memories of environmental devastation, accidents and bitter labour disputes in company towns.
Perhaps no other city knows of that legacy quite as well as Sudbury, often known as the Big Nickel, after the giant sculpture of a five-cent piece that is one of the best-known tourist attractions.

Sudbury has been a centre for the industry since the late 1800s, and by the 1980s, due to intensive nickel and copper mining, the city was the largest point-source of sulfur dioxide on the planet and had no vegetation due to acid rain, opens new tab. More than 7,000 lakes were acidifed in the region due to the pollution.

However, through decades of regreening efforts, opens new tab, including the planting of 10 million trees, the landscape has been transformed, while mining operations have cleaned up their acts.

“Over the last 40 years, places like Sudbury have made a concerted effort to reduce the industrial emissions, to develop a strategy for environmental reclamation and remediation, and operate mining operations more sustainably,” Mykytczuk says.

The Mining Association of Canada, opens new tab, has a Towards Sustainable Mining initiative, opens new tab, which supports mining companies in managing key environmental and social risks – including health and safety, biodiversity conservation, water stewardship and climate change.

Dean Winsor, executive vice president and chief people officer at copper and zinc miner Teck Resources Ltd, says sustainability is key to attracting talent to the industry. “Young, skilled people want to work for responsible companies in line with their own personal values. We need to work to ensure companies are building trust and establishing a reputation as a responsible operator so they will choose the mining sector for a career.”

Equally important is to ensure that companies actively promote diversity and inclusion in their hiring processes.

Women now make up a quarter of Teck’s workforce, an increase of 10% over the past 10 years, and 27% of all new hires in 2023 were women. But there’s still more work to do, adds Winsor, who also sits on the board at MiHR.

“We have to make sure our workplaces are inclusive, safe, and rewarding places for women to choose to work, as well as Indigenous and other groups who have historically been underrepresented in our industry.”

Cameco’s Heigh, who is also a MiHR board member, says attracting employees to its northern operations in the province of Saskatchewan is a challenge because of its isolated location. “It’s just a lifestyle that doesn’t suit everyone,” he said.

“We’re referring to it as a people crisis. There’s a huge shortage of skilled individuals and the kinds of skills that we need people to have in an evolving – and especially a digitally evolving – industry,” said Heigh.

While the exact number of digital mining jobs for future requirements is unknown, the industry is undergoing a digital transformation, and a greater number of skilled workers will be needed to develop and maintain new digital systems, including automation, robotics, autonomous haulage systems, remote controlled equipment and robotic drills, according to Natural Resources Canada.

The use and integration of digital twins – virtual replicas of physical mining assets – and advanced data analytics enhance operational decision-making, and require skills in data science, machine learning and digital engineering.

In addition to robust new and inclusive employee training programmes and incentives, Cameco spearheaded an initiative involving 15 online training programmes, which were offered free of charge to northern communities. Some course participants were offered the opportunity for paid work onsite in different roles to test the waters, and were later hired by the company.

Technological advances also mean that some of Cameco’s operations are performed remotely.
 
“They’re in an area – in some cases, in a control room – and they’re operating a set of joysticks, and they have cameras, and they never get close to areas where it’s dangerous or hard work or dirty,” Heigh said. The company will soon be looking for large drone operators for exploration purposes and small drones, which do inspections in tanks.

Michelle Edwards, senior corporate director of people, at gold miner Agnico Eagle, also takes a multi-faceted approach to addressing the recruitment crisis.

“It’s a perfect storm,” she says. “When we think about what’s coming, we have to be very creative about how we plan for our workforce and what our needs are – it’s a challenge, but it’s also an opportunity for us to really think differently around how and where we recruit for in the mining industry.”

The company participates in job fairs, proactive recruitment work and promotes itself through social media channels.

Apprenticeships and training in the workplace, including prioritising Indigenous peoples and underrepresented minority groups are also key.

“We have a very inclusive culture, and that helps to attract and retain talent across industry,” she said.

The company produced a Reconciliation Action Plan, opens new tab, developed collaboratively with Indigenous communities, employees, stakeholders and rights holders, integrating traditional knowledge into operations.

A scholarship programme takes women through a two-year development journey, increasing their visibility across the organisation, boosting leadership skills and preparing them for broader opportunities within the company.

“Women have been promoted and moved up the ranks within the organisation,” says Edwards. “We continue to partner through different STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) programmes to support hands-on experience and exposure, especially in kind of real-world mining operations at high schools and colleges, opens new tab.”

Young people are looking to hitch their wagon to responsible companies, Montpellier says.

“Ultimately, it is up to individual companies to distinguish themselves as an employer of choice and define what their compelling value proposition is to potential employees.”