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First Nation tourism growing

The Khot-La-Cha gallery and gift shop has seen boom and bust in their 40 years in North Vancouver, but the last few years have been especially good.

The Khot-La-Cha gallery and gift shop has seen boom and bust in their 40 years in North Vancouver, but the last few years have been especially good.

Aside from their local customers, owner Nancy Nightingale has been seeing a lot of tourists step through her doors looking for something unique. "It has increased especially with after the 2010, too, with the exposure of aboriginal artwork and everything," she said. "I think that made a big difference."

Even while the tourism industry has been battered by the high Canadian dollar and the recession-weary public, aboriginal businesses catering to tourists are seeing a boom right across the province.

It's the same story for North Vancouver's Takaya Tours, where manager Dennis Thomas has booked 45 tours so far and is aiming for 100 this year.

He's working full time to build what used to be a smaller joint venture into a full-fledged tourism company, taking groups from Europe, Asia and the United States onto kayaks for two-hour paddles filled with stories from his Tsleil-Waututh First Nation.

"Their jaws are open pretty much. The different excitement and the experience of the wilderness they get," he said.

Keith Henry, CEO of the West Vancouver-based Aboriginal Tourism Association of B.C., has the numbers to back up what operators are seeing in the field. In 2010, tourists spent $40 million on aboriginal businesses, double the amount from 2006, and that continued to grow even during the recession.

Tourist spending as a whole in 2010 was more than $8 billion, but that was still lower than the 2008 peak.

Just 227 of 18,000 tourism businesses across the province are aboriginal-owned and operated, but Keith said that's growing quickly, with about 100 entrepreneurs working with his office to start new ventures, including on the North Shore.

"There is tremendous growth that we're already working with right now, and we're anticipating those businesses coming online in the next three years," he said. "This frankly helps the entire tourism industry."