Parliamentary Secretaries John Les, Richard T. Lee and Rob Howard will be in Saskatoon this week for the 22nd Annual Summit of the Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER), where they will promote the development of markets for B.C.'s clean energy and improving the flow of people, goods and services across the Canada-U.S. border.

"The power of partnerships" is the theme for this year's summit, which will see more than 600 government and business leaders from PNWER's ten states, provinces and territories address the region's major policy issues.

Founded in 1991, the Pacific NorthWest Economic Region is the only statutory, non-partisan, bi-national, public-private partnership in North America. It is a forum for collaborative bi-national planning involving both the public and private sectors and offers leadership at the state and provincial level. The 22nd Annual Summit runs July 15-19.

Quotes:

John Les, Parliamentary Secretary to the Premier -

"Liquid natural gas presents tremendous prospects for B.C.'s economy. Workers and communities across the Pacific Northwest stand to benefit greatly from the development of LNG infrastructure and sales to world markets."

Richard T. Lee, Parliamentary Secretary for Asia-Pacific -

"Access to the growing Asia-Pacific market is of shared importance to provinces, territories and states in our region. Collectively, PNWER has significant resources that are in demand from Asia. To take advantage of that opportunity, B.C., Canada and our private sector partners are responding by investing in infrastructure."

Rob Howard, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transportation -

"British Columbia and Washington State have partnered successfully on many cross-border initiatives. Regional collaboration through PNWER offers the opportunity to share that experience and promote broader co-operation among jurisdictions in the Northwest."

Quick Facts:

• PNWER members are Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Alaska, Alberta, British Columbia, Northwest Territories, Saskatchewan and the Yukon.

Learn More:

About the Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER): www.pnwer.org

Contact:

Government Communications and Public Engagement
Intergovernmental Relations Secretariat
250 356-5963