Louis Joe Bernard

Louis Joe Bernard began his career in economic development at Yellowquill College, Portage La Prairie, Manitoba, and graduated with an academic excellence award in 1993. Louis Joe has since then gone on to become a Professional Aboriginal Economic Developer (Paed); and a Technical Aboriginal Economic Developer (Taed), certification with the Council for the Advancement of Native Development Officers (CANDO), and now a member of the National Certification Committee for CANDO. In 2008, in Montreal, Quebec at the National CANDO Conference, Louis Joe was voted among his peers of over 260 First Nations across Canada with the Economic Developer of the Year Award from CANDO. He was a Member of the Institute of Business Consultants (MIBC) in the United Kingdom for the past 8 years. Louis Joe also received a Certified Advanced Small Business Counselor designation from Confederation College, Thunder Bay, Ontario. He is a Certified Aboriginal Lands Officer through Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada.  Louis Joe sat as a board member for the Labour and Advanced Education Apprenticeship Division for the Mi’kmaq of Nova Scotia for 2 x 3-year terms. Louis Joe also sat on the Tripartite Economic Development Working Committee, Maritimes and Northeast Pipelines Economic Benefits Committee, and sat on the Canadian Community Economic Development Network, Ottawa, Canada. He was a member of the Michelin Aboriginal Employment Partnership Advisory Council, since 2003. In 2009, when Dr. Pamela Sloan and Dr. David Oliver from the University of Montreal (HEC) won first prize in World Competition in the 2009 oikos Foundation Global Case Writing Competition in the Corporate Sustainability Track, they wrote, “Louis Joe played an active role in enabling this case to be written, he was intimately involved in setting the direction for partnership as well as in implementing it. … this allowed us to convey the challenges and complexity of the partnership – a feature of the case that was recognized in the adjudication of the oikos competition.”

Louis Joe also sat as a Chairperson on the Centre of Excellence on Matrimonial and Real Property Law as a representative of the National Aboriginal Land Management Association (NALMA) of which he has sat on the Board of Directors. As a chairperson for the Atlantic Region Aboriginal Lands Association (ARALA) which has a membership of eighteen (18) First Nations in Atlantic Canada.  Louis Joe has been with the Union of Nova Scotia Indians-Tribal Council under the title of Community Capacity Development Officer- Economic Development as his last position before retiring from the organization in 2015. Louis Joe now sits on the Board of Directors for Whycocomagh Coop as a volunteer Vice President.