The recent expansion of some small towns in Alberta with the lack of tradespeople is challenging but there may be areas of opportunity in the future. How soon will it be, or how long depends on an influx of tradespeople needed that are qualified to build homes or are trained in specialities quickly by industry experts. Some small towns have to put expansions on hold due to costs and lack of people resources with the proper skills. In the pioneer days of Alberta, there were groups of communities that involved people within them that assisted in pulling their own ploughs for their own farmlands. However, these days as the "general world economy" has become more advanced in services and technology, labour trades in some regions seem to have excess demand and limited supply. In order to meet these excess demands workers with specialized trades or experience within the construction industry need to be brought in. But it is not this simple. What may need to happen depending on desired growth rates, which will slow, is that incentives need to be brought in to draw these construction workers from other countries perhaps like Mexico. One possible solution is to give a family from another country an opportunity to own a home for their large family that they are interested in moving here eventually. By having the local municipality offering some kind of tax breaks for their home or local perks they will draw people like they did in the old days when the perk for Europeans to move here was "cheap land". Also the wide amount of regulations to allow immigrants into Canada now with all the security and health concerns is more staggering than it has been in the past. But if one looks to the origional pioneers from Europe that had concerns with health and adapting to the climate weather etc. it may not be much different. What a community needs to do is understand the desires of why someone from a country outside Canada would want to move to their community. What is that community going to offer them in return for helping them build their community. However, it is not as simple as having a large amount of people immigrate to a smaller community. One must also consider the local valued relationships in the industry and how they affect one another. But if the federal government and the provincial government were able to find more ways to attract trade workers from outside the country, expansion and growth would continue to be steady and provide spin-off benefits for other small businesses and community operations. The problem is always big and never easy, but the comittment of leaders will make the opportunities greater for the future citizens of the community and the ones growing up in the community. |
