Nunavut's economic growth will be close to zero over the next two years, as the financial turmoil worldwide forces the private sector to rethink mining and other development projects in the territory, according to a new report.

The 2008 Nunavut Economic Outlook, released this month, says a five-year mining boon that was supposed to start in 2011 could now be delayed by five or six years.

The outlook was released by the Nunavut Economic Forum, a broad group of organizations with an interest in the territory's economic development.

"For economic growth, we need to see increases in private-sector development, and the largest component of that would certainly be in mining," Glenn Cousins, executive director of the Nunavut Economic Forum, told CBC News.

Aside from Agnico-Eagle's Meadowbank gold mine, which is expected to open in 2010, the report says no other mining exploration projects in Nunavut are guaranteed to become producing mines.

That cooldown in the mining industry may be coming at a bad time for Nunavut, which has maxed out a decade of public-sector growth caused by the territory's creation in 1999, according to the report.

"The original expectation of public-sector growth was that this was through the creation of a new territory and a new government in Nunavut after 1999," said Alastair Campbell, a representative for Inuit organization Nunavut Tunngavik Inc. on the economic forum.

"That initial growth period has been completed."

The forum's outlook says 2007 was a record year for Nunavut, when its economy grew by 13 per cent to exceed $1.1 billion.

On the bright side, the territory's mineral wealth could eventually put Nunavut back on track: the report predicts that by 2018, Nunavut's economy could be double what it was in 2007.

"The fact that the economy is slowing in some ways gives opportunities to prepare for future growth," Campbell said.

The outlook report says the past period of prosperity has built a new Inuit middle class in Nunavut, but it has also left behind Inuit who do not have the skills to participate in the modern economy. It says education is key to turning potential into prosperity.