History

In 1989, the Plant Engineering and Maintenance Association of Canada (PEMAC) was born out of the concern and vision of two professional engineers and a small group of people involved in plant and facility maintenance and engineering at both the practitioner and management levels, who shared their concerns. The concern was, and still is, that maintenance and physical asset management professionals were providing an essential service without significant recognition. The vision was to create a national association devoted to plant and facility engineering and maintenance, created by the plant and facility engineering and maintenance practitioners in Canada.

Working from the mission statement the PEMAC pioneer members focused their energies on establishing a certification program for maintenance professionals. The Maintenance Management Professional Certificate program is the result. The program was designed and developed over 9 years through a partnership between PEMAC volunteers who provided subject matter expertise, the Colleges of Ontario Network for Education and Training (CON*NECT) who provided project management, curriculum design, quality assurance and marketing expertise and Durham College who hosted the first offering of the program in 1999. The first graduates of the program completed in 2001.

The MMP Certificate Program is now being offered through Colleges, Universities and Technical Institutes across Canada. Over 600 people have completed all 8 courses in the program and have earned the right to use the MMP professional designation, which is being recognized by a growing number of employers. The MMP program is also available through internet conferencing in both English and French.

PEMAC's annual conference, MainTrain, inaugurated in 2004, has become the leading professional development event for maintenance and physical asset management in Canada, developed and produced by and for the practitioners in the industry. MainTrain events have been staged in Toronto (ON), Edmonton (AB), Fort McMurray (AB) and St. John's (NL). In 2012 MainTrain events were held in Fort McMurray in October and Toronto in November. Going forward we are rebranding MainTrain as a single, national, annual conference with plans to move it around the country with its first stop in Calgary in Novmeber 2013. For ongoing developments check out www.maintrain.ca .

In 2011 PEMAC joined the Global Forum for Maintenance and Asset Management, a step to contribute and keep our members informed of activity and initiatives at the Global level in maintenance and Asset Management practices.

These are significant accomplishments towards the vision and mission established by the founding members of PEMAC. There is much to do! Join us to both contribute to and benefit from the work inspired by our mission: "... to improve our member’s professionalism, safety, performance, and outside recognition, by providing specialized training and certification, undertaking research, providing forums for the exchange of information and acting as a public voice for our members and the profession."