Skills and Partnership Fund

As a complement to the Indigenous Skills and Employment Training program, the Skills and Partnership Fund (SPF) is a project-based fund that supports partnerships between Indigenous organizations and industry employers to provide skills training for Indigenous peoples linked to economic opportunities at the local, regional, and national level. By increasing access to training that is demand-driven, the SPF plays a key role in directly linking training efforts and Indigenous peoples to specific jobs to improve their employment outcomes.

The program funds projects that contribute to the skills development and training-to-employment of Indigenous workers towards long-term, meaningful employment. SPF encourages innovations in Indigenous training-to-employment and service delivery, including new approaches to labour market training, and improving employment outcomes for Indigenous people. This is done by supporting innovative projects to prepare and train Indigenous people for the demands of the Canadian labour market. It requires the development of partnerships and leveraging of private sector and federal-provincial-territorial funding to maximize SPF investments and testing new service delivery models to embed long-term program improvements.

Funding recipients deliver supports and services to First Nations, Inuit and Métis people to help them develop the necessary skills and training to secure jobs. Attention is given to ensuring that partnerships are in place prior to project initiation and that projects are responsive to demonstrated need with supports in the areas of training-to-employment, skills development and service innovation.