CSPC 2010 Conference Coverage

Keynote I: Issues of Our Time: Rethinking Agriculture for a Hotter, Drier World

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Chair: Pierre Noreau - President, ACFAS

Speaker(s): Dr. Nina Fedoroff - Willaman Professor of the Life Sciences, Evan Pugh Professor, Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, Penn State University

Summary:
Dr. Nina Fedoroff, Penn State professor, former science policy advisor to the US Secretary of State, a 2006 National Medal of Science winner in the field of biological sciences, and incoming president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, gave the first keynote address at CSPC 2010. Her address focussed on what she called “arguably the biggest challenge of the century”: producing food for a growing population while not destroying what is left of our planet’s biological heritage and vital ecosystems. Given the reality of ensuing climate change, we cannot expect to feed the world’s future population with the current agricultural and transportation systems, as today’s agricultural practices will not suffice in the coming climate. Dr. Fedoroff posed the question, “How do we, as scientists and policy makers, begin to think and act on such a global scale to address such complicated crosscutting problems?”

Food security, Fedoroff pointed out, is an old problem: in the early 19th century, science entered agriculture in earnest when scientists such as Evan Pugh made breakthroughs in analyzing the fundamental nutritional requirements of plants, and agricultural advancements have been driven by science and technology ever since. New technologies and applications, such as commercialized fertilizer production and the mechanization of crop harvesting, have increased crop yield while reducing manual labour. Well before these advancements, Fedoroff reminded everyone, humans increased crop yield through selective breeding. For example, our ancestors created corn as we know it today from a species of grass.

Presently, Fedoroff pointed out, we find ourselves in a tough position. The human population of our planet is a little over 7 billion, and the complex environments that used to occupy vast tracts of land have given way to the monoculture of farming and livestock. The biodiversity that once thrived, Fedoroff claims, has given way under the stress of feeding such a large human population. The loss of biodiversity, she says, is already at catastrophic levels and continues to accelerate. This is not only apparent on land, but also in our water systems, as the use of fertilizers has taken its toll on our oceans, rivers, and lakes.

Whereas we once had on average an acre of arable land per person, we now have only a half-acre of arable land per person. With the population continuing to rise and urbanize, we can only expect those numbers to decrease further. Fedoroff cautioned us to avoid the slippery slope of inaction that would allow climate change to exacerbate the problem of food security. Unless greenhouse gas reduction plans are maximally effective, we expect to see a rise in the amount of CO2 in our atmosphere beyond the presently high levels. A rise in CO2 will mean a rise in global mean temperature, which could have a debilitating effect on our crops. Importantly, seasonal high temperatures may even rise beyond the point optimal for photosynthesis. This rise in temperature might also lead to crops developing more quickly, leaving less time to accumulate the starches and proteins that comprise the bulk of the grain. Fedoroff also pointed out that the change in climate could bring about drought, an obvious obstacle to food production.

Fedoroff then asked the obvious question: what do we need to do? Her answer is that we need to reduce our ecological footprint of our agriculture, reduce the use of fresh water, reduce agricultural pollution, and, importantly, to adapt our crops to a hotter and dryer world. Perhaps the largest obstacle is that we need to do all this while simultaneously doubling the global food supply. Fortunately, Fedoroff claims, we have developed new technological tool kits that can help us deal with these problems, most notably the tools of genome sequencing and recombinant DNA technology, which we can use to modify plants to, for example, confer pest-resistance and increase crop yield.

However, some countries are resistant to modifying crops using these technologies, and have established regulatory structures to stop genetically modified organisms (GMOs) from entering the food supply because they were thought capable of harming human and animal health, as well as decreasing biodiversity. Fedoroff said than none of the hypothetical risks have proved to be real risks; no health problems have arisen from GM crop consumption. The claim that GMOs diminish biodiversity could not be further from the truth, Fedoroff claims, for since GMO crops use less fertilizer and toxic pesticides, biodiversity is preserved and promoted. As a result, she argues, we should dismantle much of this regulatory structure built around unfounded fears so as to realize the substantial benefits of GMO crops. The simple fact is that farmers migrate to GMO crops because their yield increases while cost decreases, and such yield increases are exactly what we will need in the future.

The challenges Dr. Fedoroff sees to increasing food production are difficult to meet, but not impossible. We need to make crops more tolerant to heat, flooding, and salinity, all while reducing our reliance on toxic chemicals that kill insects and pests to preserve our crops. An even deeper challenge is to increase the efficiency of photosynthesis, the process by which plants convert light energy to chemical energy. We also need to use green technologies to provide energy to agriculture, and to develop new ways to use “greywater” in irrigation systems.

Fedoroff challenged everyone to realize that the time has come to take a broader view of agriculture as a system that encompasses ecology, hydrology and energy, not just food production. We cannot step back to old methods that fed an ancient world, but we can integrate ancient wisdom while proceeding through science and evidence-based policy making. We must make better use of nutrients, energy and water in agriculture. She concluded by remarking that this “is a tall order, but if there is ever an area that is right for science policy, it is this one.”

Keynote Presentation II: Why does an ex-astronaut get involved with politics?

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Chair: Yves Joanette - Président-directeur general, Fonds de la recherche en santé du Québec

Speaker(s): Honourable Dr. Marc Garneau - Former Astronaut, Federal MP of Westmount Ville-Marie

Summary:
The Honourable Dr. Marc Garneau, former astronaut, Navy Captain, Member of the Order of Canada, and current Federal MP of Westmount Ville-Marie, spoke for the first time at the CSPC. Garneau started by addressing the question “Why does an astronaut become a politician?” Wrapped up in the answer to that question is the history of the Canadian space program and the need for science policy, so the majority of Garneau’s talk focused on both of those two themes.

Canada, Garneau said, created a space program for scientific reasons: Canadian scientists wanted to explain what caused the aurora borealis, which they had observed for some time. Scientific theories had arisen, but it was difficult to confirm any of them while grounded on Earth. Canada, motivated by the wonder of the aurora, became the third country to have a satellite in space, and has continued their drive into space as technology progressed. Canada was one of the first adopters of communication satellites after realizing they had significant advantages in enabling communications to the remote areas of the country; space science and technology in Canada had been aimed directly at connecting Canadians.

Canada has gone on to do outstanding things in space, Garneau claimed. There are currently two radar based satellites in orbit, built by Canada, for the explicit purpose of remote sensing and monitoring everything from vegetation to the flow of ice. To be sure, Garneau reminded us, this is the result of a federal policy put in place to actualize the multifaceted benefits of space technologies. Space technology is a political and scientific issue, and the Government of Canada must always pay attention to it, said Garneau.

“I went into space three times,” he exclaimed. “I saw our planet, and I realized we are damaging our planet,” though not on purpose of course, Dr. Garneau qualified; there are just so many of us living here now, and there is only a finite amount of abuse the planet can take. “I remember on my first flight, seeing a million square kilometres of burning forest over Brazil … being done to provide land to farmers,” said Garneau, going on to say that seeing things like this inspired him to bring the issue of environment to his political career. Garneau stated that there are two reasons he is in politics: one is because there are not many scientists in the House of Commons, but that is where decisions are made, and the other is his strong commitment to the environment. Canada is, for example, the second largest polluter of CO2 (per capita) in the world, and Garneau feels very strongly that we need to do our part to help in what is a global challenge.

Garneau then turned back to science policy more generally, reminding us that we must remember both federal jurisdiction and provincial jurisdiction when discussing these matters. The federal government must lead when it comes to research, he argued, and we need to have a robust federal science policy.
Science policy, Dr. Garneau claimed, has to be formulated in a way that advances knowledge in the social sciences and humanities in addition to the basic and applied sciences; for as Garneau points out, a society must evolve on all fronts, and thus all fields are important. Basic and fundamental scientific research is especially important, Garneau claimed, because breakthroughs in these areas can be just as important as those in the applied sciences.

But, Garneau cautions, science cannot operate in a vacuum. The process must serve society, such as when there is a need to focus more attention on specific areas arising from government interests. Garneau said that this shift of focus, however, should never be at the expense of other areas of science.

Garneau then raised some major concerns for Canada, and proposed that good science policy could be a step towards solutions. His central message was that there is an extremely delicate balance to be struck between energy production, the environment, and the economy. We have to deal with the messy realities and come up with pragmatic solutions, he claimed. Developing green energy is important for the environment and the economy, and it is an area where science and policy can help us out a great deal. Canada must display environmental leadership, Garneau argued, and not wait to harmonize with the United States. Currently, provinces are going ahead with environmentally progressive legislation, but the federal government is doing nothing.

Responsible development of the oil sands is also a necessary component to meeting our energy needs, Garneau stated, science is paramount in determining how to properly handle the oil sands. In meeting our energy needs, Garneau said, we also cannot rule out the use of nuclear energy, as we may not meet our environmental goals if we do not invest in clean nuclear energy. This is a big policy decision, and it is a tough one, he said, but nuclear power needs to be part of the mix, even if it is just temporary. The NRU reactor needs to be brought back to running order, he argued, because while Canada has been a pioneer in building heavy water reactors and producing medical isotopes, we cannot continue to be a leader in this area if we do not have an operable research reactor.

Garneau also spoke of his concern for the lack of participation by scientists in science policy development. The government needs to consult scientists, Garneau warned, rather than simply giving them mandates – which he sees as the current government’s approach. Canada must allow all scientists to speak freely, and to tell the government what they are doing right and what they are doing wrong. After all, Dr. Garneau claimed, the scientists are the experts, and we should be listening to them. The position of national science advisor no longer exists in Canada, but it should be the case, like in the United States, that the prime minister hears from the chief scientists in the country, who are of course getting their information from other scientists. There needs to be a scientific advisory body, Garneau claims, because only they can tell the government what it needs to hear when it comes to the science behind policy.

Garneau also said the government needs to hear stronger arguments from the scientific community about why it is important to do fundamental research. If those arguments are not heard, then the government may make the wrong decisions. The reason he is in politics, Garneau said, is because science policy is important, and there should be more scientists in politics. Garneau concluded by saying we need more scientists in policy-making and in the House of Commons, because only then will science have a greater impact on the legislation passed.

Workshop I: Special Workshop on Knowledge Brokerage and Knowledge Translation

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Organizer
Environment Canada’s Science and Technology Liaison Division,
ResearchImpact and the Canadian Water Network in collaboration with York University,
Canadian Health Services Research Foundation, and the British High CommissionModerator: Alex Bielak, Senior Advisor, United Nations-Water and Senior Fellow and Knowledge Broker UNU-INWEH

Speakers: Melanie Barwick - Psychologist and Associate Scientist, Community Health Systems Resource Group and Scientific Director Knowledge Translation, CHES – Research Institute, The Hospital for Sick Children
Leah Brannen - A/Director, Science and Technology Liaison Division, Environment Canada
Andrew Campbell - Managing Director, Triple Helix Consulting, Australia
David Clements - Director, Corporate Planning and Accountability, Canadian Institute for Health Information
Eric Gagné - Director, Science Policy Division, Environment Canada
Javier Gracia-Garza - Director General, Science and Technology Strategies Directorate, Environment Canada
David Phipps - Director, Research Services & Knowledge Exchange, York University
Courtney Price - S&T Liaison Officer, Science and Technology Liaison Division, Environment Canada
Karl Schaefer - Senior Advisor to the Director General, Water Science and Technology Directorate, Environment Canada
Andrei Sedoff - Knowledge Mobilization Officer, York University
Louise Shaxson - Director, Delta Partnership, United Kingdom
David Yetman - Director, Programs and Knowledge Mobilization, Canadian Institute for Advanced Research


Summary:
Dr. Alex Bielak welcomed participants to the workshop and introduced Dr. Andrew Campbell, the keynote speaker. Campbell’s captivating address spanned an array of practical experiences in knowledge translation and brokering, citing Land and Water Australia as a case study. The keynote gave an international dimension to the workshop, with relevance to the Canadian landscape, addressing concerns such as:

• How can applied research investors and managers create conducive conditions for research that is influential?

• How can research funders, brokers and communicators add value, without being overly prescriptive or stifling the creativity and serendipity that often characterizes the best scientific inquiry and discovery?

• In particular, what knowledge brokering and translation strategies work at the rarely elegant interface between science and policy?

Campbell reflected on his seven years of experience as CEO of Land and Water Australia, a time at which the corporation established itself as a respected knowledge brokering organization managing knowledge assets from twenty years of research and more than 1600 projects. Drawing on some powerful lessons learned from his experience, Campbell offered these astute words for the audience to contemplate during the remainder of the workshop; knowledge brokering and translation within a well-designed system can be immensely useful and valuable. It cannot be an add-on; it needs to be part of the organization.

Eric Gagné facilitated the Knowledge Café, a dynamic, interactive forum in which participants travelled from table to table to discuss their choice of 10 priority items on knowledge translation and brokering. The session was arguably one of the most engaging, deemed by the majority of participants to be an effective way to network and explore a wide range of topics in a short time. The facilitated discourse drew participants into a lively exchange of ideas and recommendations on such topics as: a suite of products and tools, community of practice, targeted dissemination, program design, performance metrics, and human resources and training. The dialogue stimulated much discussion and provided a unique opportunity for participants to share their thoughts and forge new networks within the knowledge translation and brokering community.

Recognizing that knowledge translation and brokering is a relatively new field and participants have different levels of understanding and practical application, a choice among three skill and capacity building sessions was offered to provide hands-on learning experiences. Dr. Melanie Barwick, David Yetman and Dr. David Phipps presented “Making Sense of Knowledge Mobilization,” a combination of structured and improvised learning that introduced the concept of knowledge mobilization from three professional perspectives and then opened the floor to stimulated discussion and questions from the audience. Dr. Leah Brannen, Courtney Price and Andrei Sedoff delivered a hands-on session, “Effective Written Communication to Targeted Audiences,” to sharpen participants’ instincts when identifying targeted audiences and exploring what aspects of research “speaks” to different audiences. The session also sought to improve participants’ ability to craft written communication products to meet users’ needs. Facilitated by Louise Shaxson, the “Finding the Right Tools” session addressed the struggle to identify appropriate knowledge brokering tools to actively engage with a specific user community. The interactive session provided participants with a broad overview of tools currently in use and drew on the collective experience to explore the boundaries of a knowledge brokering toolkit and what types of tools might populate such a toolkit.

A highlight of the workshop was the Expert Panel session moderated by Bielak and featuring three of Canada’s leading experts in knowledge translation and brokering. Phipps spoke to the practitioner’s perspective; David Clements gave voice to that of a non-government organization in the field of health, and Karl Schaefer imparted his views as a senior federal government employee. After a brief presentation by each, a lively exchange of opinions, concerns and ideas ensued prompted by provocative questions from the moderator and the audience. Several key messages emerged. Among them: move beyond debates about terminology and “just do it”; measure impact at the user level and acknowledge that measures can be qualitative; recognize models and practices of commerce, marketing, technology transfer, and funding and grant application procedures to act as drivers and to legitimize activities; don’t expect a cultural change valuing little-C over Big-C communication to be delivered from the top-down in large organizations; and, develop a cohesive voice before entering into an international arena, as we have a lot more considerations to sort through, including the rules of engagement.

Before, during and after the workshop, participants and other interested individuals relayed insights and provided updates on the event through an active social network using blogs and a discussion forum on the workshop’s website. Over the course of the day, a volley of Twitter messages relayed interesting observations and added to conversations about the sessions. To foster continued dialogue among participants post-event, the workshop’s network website (http://researchimpact.othree.ca/ktkb2010) remains open to attendees and other members of the knowledge translation and brokering community. The lessons from the workshop were relayed to, and built upon, at a subsequent workshop held in the United Kingdom in November 2010 and dealt with 'Improving the impact of development research through better communication and uptake.'

Prior to closing remarks by Bielak, Campbell returned to the podium to present a Listener’s Report that reflected on the day. Campbell congratulated the organizers on a job well done, noting an overwhelmingly positive impression of the workshop. He stated that the cross-sectional nature of the participants in the workshop was an enormous strength and a lot could be gained by ongoing networking and communities of practice across the mix of sectors, organizations and institutions represented at the event.

Workshop II: Career Development

Workshop Leaders: Jeffrey Kinder - Manager, Science and Technology Strategy, Natural Resources Canada
Eric Gagné - Director, Science Policy Division, Environment Canada

Invited Participants: Eleanor Fast - Program Director, Council of Canadian Academies
Marcius Extavour - AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow, United States Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
Jen Hiscock - Science and Technology Advisor, Natural Resources Canada


Summary:
Jeffrey Kinder opened the session on career development by introducing himself and his co-participants. After Kinder reminded the group that science policy includes both policy for science and science for policy, Eric Gagné gave a welcoming in French as a way of encouraging participation in either official language. Both Kinder and Gagné explained that the session was only going to be profitable if the group participated, so they continued this highly successful workshop with an icebreaker.

Everyone was asked to stand up and locate themselves on an imaginary map of Canada. The map quickly had to expand since there were participants from Boston and Washington D.C. present, along with a nearly complete cross-section of Canada. Once people were situated, Kinder and Gagné invited everyone from East to West to introduce themselves to the room. The participants were largely doctoral students and post-docs, mainly from Montréal, Ottawa, and Toronto. There were also several participants on the employment side of the equation, from places like university administration and government.
After the ice breaker the participants were invited to go to one of four writing easels situated in the four corners of the room and brainstorm, in small groups, a response to the question "What do you need to get into science policy?" Each group wrote their responses to the question and then nominated one person to present their findings to the room. As the summaries were presented it became obvious that each of the four groups had interpreted the question differently. Some groups had chosen to focus on the skills required for a career in science policy (communication and subject knowledge), others had focussed on job-searching (cover letters and resume-building) or career paths (government, media, or university). This resulted in a rich variety of answers, with one answer constant to all four groups: networking. Everyone in the room agreed that meeting and connecting with people in science policy was the best way to get into a career in science policy.

Both the session organizers and the three invited participants then gave a summary of how they got into science policy, describing their varied but similar backgrounds. All five of them started in science and engineering degrees, and all of them realized while pursuing their education or sometime early in their career that what really excited them were the consequences of science and technology, rather than the actual practice of science or engineering. Every single one of them used 'passion' to describe how they knew they had found the perfect career path for themselves. They described how the combination of luck, networking, being in the right place (Ottawa) at the right time, and hard work had got them started in their career path, and they described the varied ways to get into science policy (further education, fellowship, internship, volunteer work, Engineers without Borders, or even a seemingly unrelated government contract). The variety of careers the five participants represented demonstrated how exciting and challenging the field of science policy can be.

Following these personal histories the full group was again put to work brainstorming questions regarding what challenges each person thought they might face in getting a career in science policy. Kinder and Gagné split the questions into four categories: “networking,” “can I do it?”, “information,” and “education.” Everyone was asked to go to the category that appealed to them most and to brainstorm answers and solutions to each of the questions. Once the groups were finished coming up with solutions they were asked to go around the room marking the four boards with stars for their preferred strategies in each category.

Each of the four categories focused on similar solutions, with networking remaining a key component at all four stations. Given the prevalence of networking in both discussions the whole group then brainstormed ways that the Canadian Science Policy Centre (CSPC) and Conference in 2011 could improve networking opportunities. While it was generally agreed that the 2010 conference provided a great opportunity for networking, it was also suggested that the CSPC could perhaps maintain a job bank, acting to facilitate one-on-one connections between experienced policy workers and aspiring policy wonks. This might include a type of mentorship where experienced members of the science policy community could reach out to the more junior members, answering questions they might have about career possibilities. In order to kick-start some of the potential networking initiatives, Kinder and Gagné collected the names and email addresses of everyone present.

Another suggestion to come out of the workshop was that science graduate degrees could make room for a communication or policy requirement within the degree; this was taken as a suggestion that the CSPC could work with universities to have some such requirement added to curricula. It was not expected that the CSPC could actually alter the degree requirements of any university, but it was suggested that the CSPC could gradually build an argument in favour of such requirements.

In the last few minutes of the session Kinder explained what a day in his life looks like, so that attendees would know what sort of work environment they were striving to get in to. The day previous he had participated in an interdepartmental Assistant Deputy Minister meeting at 8:30am, which happens every other Tuesday and includes the twelve government departments with science mandates. Following this meeting he had to deal with urgent "fire-fighting": issues that are not anticipated to be part of his daily agenda, but crop up on a regular basis and have to be answered in time to prepare the Minister for question period. In this case, he had to deal with the recent negative press NRCan received due to the “muzzling” of government scientists. His afternoon was spent in a workshop devoted to integrating science and policy more effectively.

The session was even more popular than the organizers had anticipated. Over 35 people attended. It was widely agreed that this workshop, or a variation of it, should be held as part of every future Canadian Science Policy Conference. It was also the general consensus that 2010 conference had provided many opportunities for networking, but that the Centre could, given adequate resources, take specific actions to connect senior and junior members of the science policy community for career coaching, both during future conferences and in between annual conferences.

Workshop III: The Making of a Science Entrepreneur

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Organizer
Jeffrey Kinder - Manager, Science and Technology Strategy, Natural Resources CanadaModerator: Shiva Amiri - Science and Innovation Officer, British High Commission

Panellists: Bonnie Schmidt - President and Founder, Let's Talk Science
Peter Hackett - Executive Professor and Special Advisor, Vice-President of Research, School of Business, University of Alberta

Summary:
Shiva Amiri opened the session by introducing the two speakers and their topics. Schmidt was to talk about the science half of making science entrepreneurs and Hackett was going to cover the entrepreneurial side. Before getting started with the talks, Amiri queried the audience to get a sense of their backgrounds, revealing that they were overwhelmingly from the university sector.

Schmidt spoke about the difficulties of teaching science entrepreneurship. She explained that the current method is to attempt to layer additional skills onto scientists. She pointed out that, with a few exceptions, this method simply does not work when trying to convert scientists into entrepreneurs. And not only that, but Canada is currently producing less scientists and engineers according to the latest OECD reports. She added one complaint about the OECD report: it does not count college students who are in science, technology, and engineering streams.

Schmidt's preferred method for imparting science entrepreneurial skills is not to give business skills to PhD candidates, but to use outreach at much younger ages. Let's Talk Science goes to elementary and high schools to give students hands on experience with science, which she feels is valuable because teachers generally do not accommodate the kinaesthetic, hands-on learners. These tactile learners tend to be the kind of tinkerers who could simultaneously be effective scientists and entrepreneurs, but they often do not discover a love of science in the current educational system. Schmidt is convinced that outreach is highly effective in increasing the number and variety of capable students pursuing science and engineering degrees.
After her description of Let's Talk Science and her efforts at outreach, Schmidt then asked the audience to discuss five questions in small groups: What are three practices to increase youth engagement? What are three characteristics of a successful entrepreneur? What are three ways to teach entrepreneurs? What are the top three measures of success? Who should be teaching entrepreneurial skills, and where should they be taught?

The group's answers followed the lead provided by Schmidt in her talk. Three practices that increase youth engagement listed by the audience were: mentorship, science fairs. and learning modules. The audience came up with more than three, somewhat conflicting characteristics of a good entrepreneur: stubbornness, a broad perspective, an open mind, an ability to communicate, and a willingness to take on risk. Five useful teaching practices that the audience came up with were: discussion of case studies, mentorship, cooperative programs, workshops, and competitions. For the fourth question the audience suggested five possible measures of success: number of companies, number of repeat or serial entrepreneurs, social and economic impact or value of innovations, the diversity of entrepreneurial ideas, and the increased productivity of the Canadian economy. It was widely agreed that entrepreneurial skills could be successfully taught in different ways, by people operating at all levels of education.

Hackett's main point was that Canada is a place, currently, with a lot of barriers preventing effective entrepreneurship. His talk was a whirlwind of examples and statistics in support of this claim. He gave a definition of entrepreneurship as the act, by a company, of commercializing as a product what was previously only a technology. For entrepreneurship to occur, creativity is absolutely essential and a person must want to “win” rather than simply be right. Hackett listed seven other necessary conditions for entrepreneurial success: having experience, customers, sales, mentors, being smart with money, having access to capital and talent.

Hackett then discussed two measures indicative of Canada’s poor performance. First, Canadian venture capitalists tend to make a two percent return on their investment, ten times less than their American counterparts. Second, Canada is consistently producing fewer PhD's than other countries; this, at best, will replace the existing professors. He also pointed out that the current education system has a tendency to teach the skills required in the past, not the ones that will be needed in the future.
Hackett then listed his four barriers to successful entrepreneurship in Canada. Culturally, Canada has always been a resource producing country. Government and university policies also do not support industry or venture capitalists, having over-regulated the potential for spin-offs. Intellectual property rights, claimed at numerous other points during the conference to be a problem area in Canada, was also seen as a problem by Hackett. Last, he noted that there are often idiosyncratic barriers.

Hackett then asked the groups to discuss four questions: What are three ways to improve the culture of support? What three actions could be taken to remove barriers in academic institutions? What three actions that could be taken to remove barriers in government agencies? And, like Schmidt, what are the three best measures of innovation?

The audience came up with a variety of interesting answers that went beyond Hackett's and Schmidt's talks. Three ways to improve the culture of support that the audience raised were: to encourage the raw energy of highly skilled immigrants rather than putting barriers up to prevent competition with existing Canadians, using taxes and tax breaks to incentivize returns rather than only investments, and to think globally. Regarding barriers within academia the audience had several suggestions: fix the rewards system by including patents as well as publications, encourage cross-disciplinary problem-solving, award business sabbaticals, clear up ownership of intellectual property, reduce the time-consuming over-head in winning and maintaining grants, realign faculties for the 21st century, and broadcast success stories with a national award of high honour. The audience had less to offer for the barriers within government agencies: they suggested only that there should be a more intelligent granting system and that public service should be of the highest quality. For the final question added some new possibilities to those previously discussed including job creation, the lifespan of created companies, and exports.

Hackett and Schmidt then asked for three main messages that could be passed along to the CSPC from this workshop. The audience responded that there needs to a way to bridge the science and entrepreneurship within government, academia, and industry. The audience also agreed that it was important to point out that there is a lot more at issue here than money. Finally, the audience suggested breaking down all the barriers discussed, especially those associated with granting and peer review; creativity of all types should be rewarded.

In the ensuing discussion, Andrew Munro noted that there was no discussion of research within industry, and that most of the examples discussed during the workshop were not researchers. He suggested that a better understanding could be gained by comparing locations with low barriers (Waterloo) and high barriers (Guelph).

Plenary Session I: Science and Technology as Agents of Economic Recovery

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Moderator : Gilles Patry - President and CEO, Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI)

Panellists: Chad Gaffield - President, Social Science and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC)
Heather Munroe-Blum - Principal and Vice-Chancellor, McGill University
Robert Prichard - Chair, Torys LLP and Vice-Chair, Science, Technology, and Innovation Council (STIC)
Genevieve Tanguay - Ministry of Economic Development, Innovation and Export Trade, Quebec


Summary:
The session moderator, Gilles Patry, began with three questions for the panellists to use to frame their talks: is science and technology an agent of economic recovery? If so, how so? If not, how can it become one?

Heather Munroe-Blum, Principal of McGill University, emphasized how quickly the major economic powers on the world stage are changing, the importance of innovation in driving economic growth, and the importance of academia, industry and government in innovation. Emerging economies are currently making substantial investments in education and R&D, she said, increasing their competitiveness on the global stage by making investments to increase their production of masters and PhDs. As such, Canada must continue to support the development, retention, and attraction of world-class masters and PhD students.

Despite past investments, R&D as a portion of gross domestic product has dropped since 2004, and the amount of R&D conducted by Canadian small and medium enterprises (SMEs) remains low. Canadian universities need to reach out to SMEs and adopt similar strategies as, for example, Scandanavian countries and India. These nations have developed successful strategies to connect university research with the needs of industry, and these strategies are worth emulating. Munroe-Blum argued that provinces need to adopt long-term science and technology policies so as to avoid “roller coaster” funding that invests heavily in creating organization and institutions that are later eliminated due to lack of support. Additionally, provinces need to work together to develop policy frameworks for innovation that inter-connect provinces and link in to federal policies. Finally, Munroe-Blum argued that Canada needs to develop a common intellectual policy framework that protects students, protects the right to publish, and allows ideas and talent to flow freely.

Robert Pritchard, Vice-Chair Science, Technology, and Innovation Council, explained STIC’s role to advise the government through the Minister of Industry on matters related to Canada’s science and innovation agenda. Pritchard commented that Canada has done well through the global financial crisis, and is in a position of relative strength with its abundant resources, well educated population, diverse and globally connected citizenry, and strong public finances; nevertheless, he cautioned, we should not be complacent in our position. We are challenged by an aging population, lagging productivity, and a significant shift in the focus of global business away from the United States, our largest trading partner. Science and technology must be the agency of economic recovery, as it is the only sustainable strategy. Canada cannot compete on its size alone, but must work on being smart and innovative.

Canada has gotten a lot of things right: strong universities, top researchers, and a suite of programs to improve our research capacity (such as those detailed by Munroe-Blum). But, Pritchard argued, we are struggling with encouraging businesses to invest in R&D, despite high government subsidies; and despite much research on this issue, there is no clear answer on how to proceed. But since it takes decades to create institutions and build clusters, we must remain consistent in our approach as well as looking for innovative policies focussed on competition and investment, not on entitlements. This will mean only picking winners, but world-class quality requires us to focus on building and maintaining successful clusters. Government should produce policies that help share risk with entrepreneurs while engaging in strategic procurement to help create market demand. There is also a need to simplify and standardize how we connect industry and universities, particularly with intellectual property. According to Pritchard we should try to generate a culture of innovation and winning by celebrating these achievements, and taking pride in success.

Genevieve Tanguay discussed some of the initiatives taken in Quebec to support innovation. These initiatives are organized around four main policy axes: making research more productive and competitive; producing, attracting, and retaining talent; assembling tools that bridge the gaps between research and SMEs; and investing in key mobilizing projects that leverage Quebec’s existing areas of excellence. Quebec has made a substantial investment in innovation, providing the largest tax credit system for R&D, reinforcing public research, encouraging the amount of research conducted by businesses, and reinforcing technology transfer mechanisms. Quebec has recognized that they cannot change their strategy every three years, but instead need to invest in a long-term strategy by focussing on the province’s strengths. Thus, Quebec has undertaken four new projects building on Quebec’s strengths in aerospace, the life-sciences, internet and communications technology, and green technology.

Chad Gaffield next argued that Canada must begin to re-imagine innovation and develop a new vocabulary with new metaphors, re-imagining innovation as something new for the 21st Century. The 20th century model of innovation was linear, with innovations pushing out from the laboratory to the marketplace. The 21st century model of innovation is a people-centred model, representing a paradigmatic shift in how we think about innovation. This requires a redefining of the university campus as existing at the heart of innovative communities, as well as finding new modes of engagement to bring together the private, public, and not-for-profit sectors.

During the question period, Alex Bielak of the United Nations University Institute on Water, Environment, and Health asked what is being done in Quebec to facilitate knowledge translation and knowledge brokerage. Tanguay responded by saying Quebec has a strong network of organizations that are responsible for working directly with industry, particularly SMEs, and discussing with them the kinds of university research being conducted and its value for industry.

Danielle Tonguay of Trema Management Consultants asked for a specific example of an avenue of action that would translate science and technology into economic and social innovation, suggesting that the movement of graduate students into the receptor community might be an example. Heather Munroe-Blum suggested that the notion of using graduate students beyond our institutions and putting them into industry is a strategy we have not used in Canada, but that it has been used effectively in Scandinavian nations. Genevieve Tanguay noted, however, that they have been using this strategy in Quebec, though it has been slow in starting because a) professors want their students to focus on finishing their studies on time, and b) industry is, unfortunately, rarely prepared to accept those students.

Plenary session II: Advancing Science and Fostering Innovation through International Cooperation

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Introductory Remarks
Chad Gaffield - President, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Chair: John McDougall - President, National Research Council

Panellists: Joseph Hubert - Vice President, Research and International Relations, l’Université de Montréal
Howard Bergman - Vice-President and Scientific Director, Fonds de la Recherche en Santé du Québec (FRSQ)
Peter Singer - CEO, Grand Challenges Canada
Ilse Treurnicht - CEO, MARS Discovery District

Summary:
The panel and its chair John McDougall, president of the National Research Council (NRC) were introduced by Chad Gaffield, who emphasized the role of the NRC in building our current “Made in Canada” voice on research. Gaffield presented plenary chair John McDougall’s work ensuring the NRC fulfills its role of fostering innovation.

McDougall began by describing CSPC 2010 as an exciting conference with an important topic, building on the previous year, and attracting many interesting people from government, academia, industry, and science policy. For the NRC as well as for science and technology, international collaboration is essential for creating and enhancing value and building win-win opportunities between Canada and the world. We need access to the global knowledge pool, and to advance science and foster innovation we need to share understanding of how networks work.

Joseph Hubert described several different models of collaboration. “Classical” models involve collaboration between individuals, and the exchange and co-supervision of students, while “classical extended” models involve collaboration between labs, centers, and institutes. The further extension of this model includes international laboratories (for example, INSERM and CNRS) that involve much larger collaboration, bringing together different areas of knowledge with an exchange of scientists between the laboratories. Transportation studies coming from l’Université de Montréal and l’Université de Laval are two examples of such international “collaboratories”: the Centre Interuniversitaire de recherche sur les réseaux d’entreprise, la logistique et le transport (CIRRELT), and the Centre of Excellence for Early Childhood Development (CEECD). CIRRELT involves research centres in Finland, Montreal, and Norway. The results of this collaboration, in addition to standard academic output, have been the application of innovative industrial research in freight transportation planning for Norway.

CEECD, on the other hand, is an example from the social sciences. CEECD was created in 2001, conceived under the premise that children experience accelerated growth during their first five year, and that the education, care, and attention they receive during this period has a decisive effect on their future. The centre’s aim is to improve and disseminate knowledge about children’s social and emotional development, so it is crucial that they get this information to policymakers and parents. The original national consortium produced an online encyclopedia of early childhood development, whose results were used for Canadian policy. This project was eventually expanded, offering customized results in Spanish specifically for Chilean society, and in Portuguese for Brazilian society. A partnership was eventually created with a Dutch private international foundation to focus CEECD’s work on childhood development in underdeveloped countries, and an international network was launched for a new consortium with the aim of enhancing network expansion for increased global impact on the way people do research.

CEECD’s innovation is to transfer knowledge of best practices that are adapted to the countries in which it will be applied, as well as to train early-career researchers in an international environment. As an impact of international collaboration, the centre has vastly increased the quality and relevance at the local level of material produced, with a quarter million people using the encyclopedia.

Howard Bergman’s talk described the work of the FRSQ and the integration of Quebec researchers internationally. The FRSQ is not just where scientists go for funding, he said, as it has concrete responsibilities to plan, coordinate, support, and animate Quebec’s health research sector, to develop partnerships, and to reap the benefits of health research for citizens. Their core programs support 19 research centers in Quebec university hospitals, as well as grants for students at many levels and career research awards. They also have strategic structured research groups and 18 themed networks (including aging, cardiovascular health, cancer, pain, and suicide). These networks have a bottom-up structure uniting the “best of Quebec” in particular domains.

Bergman argued that research can no longer be done in isolation; it must be multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and part of university, national, and international networks. The FRSQ was the first provincial research foundation to get to the national and international stage; helping Quebec scientists integrate into such networks, building on their innovative thematic networks and programs, and being able to target those themes that are in line with government priorities. For example, the FRSQ has bilateral targeted partnerships with France (Alzheimer’s, personalized health care) China (progressing from a biannual colloquium on genetic medicine to a collaborative model targeting reasonable priorities) and Israel (drug discovery and development, as well as partnerships with industry). Through these partnerships, the FRSQ was challenged by needing distinct ways of functioning within foreign countries, even in France where the language was the same. The FRSQ’s plan is to build on its existing themes and to develop new ones, as well as develop partnerships with India and the United States. Connecting to the European Research Area Network (ERA-NET) will both integrate scientists and facilitate Canadian and provincial funding organizations’ fostering of multi-level collaboration via large research networks.

Bergman concluded that research in Quebec and Canada has to be seen in its developing international context. Research themes are too complex for one lab, one province, or one country. We must compete with and be compared with the best internationally, and federal and provincial funding agencies need to develop strategic priorities for collaboration. This strategy must draw from our own research community of experts; we have the responsibility to orient, facilitate and fund scientists’ international collaboration, being careful that their funding applications do not make their lives too difficult. We must be aware of and respect their needs, and support their collaborative partnerships.

Peter Singer started by calling the CSPC a great, bottom-up, grassroots effort from young people, acknowledging the organizers as doing something very worthwhile, and encouraged sponsorship and support from organizations for next year’s conference. For Singer, talking about international cooperation is a very patriotic thing, for it’s really about how we see Canada’s role in the world. How well have we elaborated our role? We have so much innovation that “Canada as Innovator” could be our brand. But do we really have a strategy? Singer suggested that we do not. In global health, Canada has never taken a strategic look at our role in innovation. While we are currently launching an assessment of our role in global health, we ought to also consider how we want others to see us. Our comparative advantage is not necessarily power, but innovation, and grassroots meetings such as the CSPC are important for contemplating our international image and strategy.

One nimble, quick, and flexible way to do international cooperation is the “grand challenges” approach. Grand challenges have a history in mathematics, beginning with David Hilbert’s challenge to solve his list of unsolved problems in mathematics at the beginning of the 20th century. Many people are still actively working to solve some of the unsolved problems Hilbert had listed; others have been solved in the 100 years since he posed them. The pressing problems of global health demand a shorter timeline, however, and in 2003, Bill Gates launched the Grand Challenges in Global Health, resuscitating this approach. The critical aspect of a grand challenge is its critical barrier that remains to be overcome (for example, discovery science, downstream delivery, or social issues).


Grand Challenges Canada launched in May, 2010; the first time that a country has funded a grand challenge in its foreign aid envelope. Following Canada’s lead, USAID launched a service delivery grand challenge in maternal and neonatal health in September 2010. This is a prime example of an innovative role for Canada being followed by others. Yet the challenges to global health remain immense, including vast international imbalances in child and maternal mortality. Singer argued that this is neither fair nor right; thus, we need to do things differently and better, and this is both the definition and the role for innovation. In the 2008 budget, the Development and Innovation fund was meant to support the world’s best minds, to bring about enduring changes for the lives of millions of people in poor countries; language like this is, unfortunately, not found in the foreign aid envelope of any other federal budget.



Grand Challenges Canada’s mission is to identify global grand challenges in health, fund a global research community, and support the implementation of emerging solutions. They are the first to take this approach, seeing grand challenges as addressing specific critical barriers that, if removed, would help solve important health problem in the developing world. Canada’s core concept of grand challenges is one of integrated innovation between science and technology innovation, social innovation, and business innovation. The advantages of the grand challenges approach are that it provides focus; brings the best minds to the table; creates collaborative, global, and interdisciplinary communities; recruits new talent; captures public imagination; and provides a platform for global governance.
Singer concluded by situating the grand challenges approach as an opportunity for G8/G20 countries to pursue global health innovation and to rally around common goals, in a platform for cooperation and global governance.

Ilse Treurnicht first asked what fostering innovation through international cooperation means for technology and social businesses in Canada, and how this will influence policy. She argued that globalization of innovation is both an enormous threat and an enormous opportunity for emerging technology and social businesses in Canada, which inhabit a complicated landscape. The pace of innovation is accelerating, and many emerging companies have concurrently had to put the brakes on their development due to a lack of funding or early adopter struggles. Additionally, R&D drivers are shifting, and the flow of information around the world has changed the way young companies work, as the barriers to entry have been lowered significantly. We must correspondingly rethink how we invest in, build, and capture value. The growingly skilled talent pool in emerging economies changes the way emerging companies think about talent. If entrepreneurial talent is the driver of global innovation, then the emerging economies are now a force to be reckoned with. The availability of risk capital is moving towards China, India, Brazil; venture capital used to be local, but now we can invest far from home. As a result, our young companies can and must look elsewhere for early adopters; however, since our border to the south has thickened, we are forced to look beyond the US. We also must understand that a strong, outstanding scientific research base is needed for table stakes at the global innovation game.

Treurnicht’s observations lead to the policy recommendation that Canada has to match our areas of excellence with what the world needs. We need to think about how we extend our national and international networks; if we can build a true collaboration model across this country to allow us to contribute to both national and international innovation systems, that collaboration will enable our collective success. We also need, she argued, to not only look at how our programs attract the best minds in the world to come to Canada, but also to augment our training of students through cross-cultural training and internships so our students are equipped to work both nationally and internationally. Expansion of business development is also needed, but there are problems in achieving this end: we currently do business too far removed from our customers, and our funding programs enable hiring another R&D person while not necessarily enabling the hire of a business development person. We need to build a risk capital system, and we need local partners to co-invest with other investors. Finally, we must diligently watch for complacency, despite Canada having emerged from the recession in a relatively strong position. Our innovation challenges and opportunities have only been studied pre-crash, requiring a deeper level of analysis of the subsectors where we may have a competitive advantage. We need to think about emerging economies and converging technologies, and seek and develop strategic foresight about where the world is going and how we can benefit.

To conclude, Treurnicht described how Canada is at a fork in the road: we must ask whether we are going to be a provider or a buyer of solutions. There are good reasons to build a global company from Canada in Canada today, so we can approach this challenge with some confidence, but we must move from blunt and superficial policy analysis toward deeper analysis identifying subsets of businesses, their needs, and their potential as drivers of job growth in the future. The next generation of Canadians needs us to focus on the challenge of growing “sticky” companies with deep roots.
The session ended with a question period focussing on Canada’s competitiveness, our grandiosity problem (meaning that we need to execute on very specific focused challenges, rather than speaking overly abstractly about vague goals and agendas), our potential for development of innovative collaboration, and how we can accelerate our achieved export of excellence. Chair John McDougall finished the session by remarking that, through these kinds of discussions, we all come to better understand how innovative collaboration works and how Canada can be a part of it.

Special Lunch Presentation by Council of Canadian Academies

Moderator: Margaret McCuaig-Johnston - Executive VP,
Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC)


Panellists: Paul Davenport - Chair of the Expert Panel on Research Integrity, Council of Canadian Academies

Summary:
Dr. Paul Davenport, former President of the University of Western Ontario, recently chaired a panel of experts that produced a report entitled “Honesty, Accountability and Trust: Fostering Research Integrity in Canada,” at the request of the Council of Canadian Academies. This report was designed to examine and analyze academic integrity in Canada, as well as make recommendations based on that analysis.

The current landscape of academic integrity in Canada is best described as local and non-legislative, claimed Davenport. Unlike the United States, for example, which has a national policy with legislation to enforce it, Canada’s approach centers around the local rules and influence of research institutions. The fundamental conclusion of the report is that all the actors partaking in research, from individual researchers to government agencies, must come together under a unified approach to maintaining academic integrity.

Davenport said the report found significant gaps in the current policy. To fill the gaps, there needs to be a common set of values and principles that balance transparency with privacy. To achieve that, a centralized way of handling academic integrity needs to be established; in the long run, however, education about the rules of academic integrity will be the best protection against plagiarism.

The report recommends the creation of a new entity, the Canadian Council for Research Integrity, whose primary purposes would be facilitating research integrity practices and supporting the research community. This would be a non-governmental organization that would, while leaving rule creation and enforcement to local institutions, take the lead in integrity education and outreach.

In conclusion, Davenport said, we need a positive, value-based approach to research and integrity in Canada. Such a system must be unified and bring all the actors together. All those that take part in research, in any way, have a great stake in the integrity of the process, and a great responsibility to maintain it. Our future success as a prosperous nation depends on our ability to produce and implement good science, and if Canada were to have research integrity issues, there would be a great loss in the public confidence of our science. Davenport notes that we have seen these problems in other parts of the world, and that we want to be sure that they do not come to Canada.

During a brief question period, Yves Gingras questioned the motivation for creating the oversight council that Davenport’s report ultimately recommends. If there is no issue of integrity loss in Canada, he argued, it makes little sense to start importing practices from elsewhere meant to deal with the idiosyncratic issues of academic and research integrity faced by other nations. Davenport admitted that there is no evidence of significant breaching of integrity in Canada, but argued that having a council to monitor and maintain research integrity would ensure it never becomes a serious problem in Canada.

Special Keynote Address by the Minister of State (Science and Technology)

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Speaker: Hon. Dr. Gary Goodyear - Federal Minister of State (Science and Technology), Member of Parliament for Cambridge & North Dumfries

Summary:
The Honourable Gary Goodyear, Minister of State for Science and Technology within the Harper government, spoke for the second consecutive year at the CSPC. Even in the short year that has elapsed between the first and second conference, Goodyear said he already sees the impact of the conference; it has brought together stakeholders from across Canada and is making a significant contribution to science policy discussion across the country. The conference, he says, is about bringing together policy, government, industry, and academia.

Goodyear noted that 2010 has been a great year for research in Canada. In the past year crucial research was carried out in our country, with researchers from across the world coming to take part in it. This seems to be the opposite of the 1990’s “brain drain,” as the government has established Canada as a place where the best minds come to research.

Goodyear believes that a significant turnaround came about two years ago when the Harper government launched the new science and technology strategy, the goal of which was to create jobs, strengthen our economy, and make life better for all Canadians. The strategy emphasized keeping the best and the brightest researchers in Canada. That was not just something done on paper, Goodyear claims, as rather substantial changes have already been realized. Science and technology has received more funding than any department in these most difficult economic times, making sure that our Canadian colleges and universities are plugged into the innovation system to ensure that Canada continues to lead the way in science and technology.

But Canada still faces challenges, Goodyear said, as R&D in the business sector is severely lacking, a fact continually addressed throughout the proceedings of CSPC 2010. We need to remain globally competitive, but businesses have not reinvested the gains made after the recent economic recovery that would allow them to compete in the future. This is why Mr. Goodyear is looking to make support for R&D more efficient at the commercial level, launching a governmental review last year to address this issue.

The focus of the R&D review will be on federal programs and activities that promote private sector infrastructure. In a year, the panel will report to Goodyear, hopefully leading to better alignment between industry and the government that supports it so as to improve the overall position of Canada’s companies in the global marketplace. The stakes are very high, Mr. Goodyear points out, and the timing is quite critical. Economies that apply R&D to their products will become the future’s economic leaders. Leading the way in these areas will ensure Canada’s prosperity.

Special Keynote Address by Minister of Economic Development, Innovation, and Export Trade (Quebec)

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Speaker: Honourable Clément Gignac – MNA for Marguerite-Bourgeoys, Minister of Economic Development, Innovation, and Export Trade

Summary:
The Honourable Clément Gignac spoke during a special lunch session at CSPC 2010. Due to some miscommunication between the CSPC organizing committee and Gignac’s office, the Minister’s attendance and address was unexpected, and he humorously apologized for his presence. Gignac then discussed Québec’s S&T goals and strategies, stating that CSPC 2010 was a unique opportunity for everyone to share ideas and discuss science policy in Canada, and to reinforce the ties between stakeholders and decision makers.

Québec has been active in setting up science policy for many years, Gignac noted. In the 60’s the Québec government set up structures and programs aimed at, among other things, fostering cooperation between colleges and their industrial and community partners. It was the 70’s that began Québec’s development of research-oriented structure, leading to the establishment of the Québec system of innovation. Québec undertook a massive catch-up effort during the 80’s, investing in industrial R&D and innovation systems. Since then these strategies have been consolidated, and in 2006 the government established the first Québec innovation strategy, aiming to make research and development the basis of competitiveness and job creation in Québec.

Gignac commented that his job, as a politician, is not to make friends, but to lay the foundations for increased wealth creation. Innovating in Québec means growing, increasing productivity, and creating jobs, because Québec needs to face international competition. Québec and Ontario are sometimes seen as in competition for talent, but Gignac emphasizes that the provinces together compete for talent in the global market, and that their interests are therefore aligned. To utilize our shared advantages, Ontario and Québec need to work together to develop their shared R&D and S&T resources, and Gignac invites us to watch his government executes this inter-provincial strategy to attract talent to Canada’s research centres in the years to come. Connecting his speech to Goodyear’s speech the day before, Gignac asserted Québec’s commitment to investing in fundamental research, and to this end, said the Québec government will invest more than $1.1 billion by 2013 to mobilize Québec, promoting innovation and prosperity.

Gignac then discussed the enigma that, despite high relative investments in R&D, Québec has lower productivity gains than other parts of Canada. He suggested that a greater focus on innovation and commercialization could solve this problem as Québec seeks to use S&T investment to brand themselves as “the place in North America … with the lowest carbon footprint.”

Québec’s surprising gain in jobs after the recession, relative to the US and Ontario, can be attributed to a low reliance on manufacturing, and a high reliance on S&T research. Asserting their “green” brand, Québec researchers are developing green aircrafts, buses, and other products to position Québec as a centre for developing green technologies. These strategies, along with measures meant to attract foreign talent to Québec, stimulate entrepreneurship, and the coming appointment of a provincial science officer should together ensure the research excellence of Québec in the years to come.