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About a decade after the Strategy launched, Statistics Canada conducted a series of matched-company studies that consistently showed that NSERC’s partnership programs were among the most impactful of the Federal government’s innovation programs. Nice … but what has that meant for the Canadian economy?
Gellatly and Gu’s recent article for Statistics Canada (see the first comment) says that company innovation has had little to no measurable impact on industrial productivity – which some may use to question the rationale for a wide variety of government support programs. It appears that the net impacts of the government’s innovation supports appear to be overshadowed by other economic factors that have seen a decrease in new business-creation, and flat to declining business R&D/GDP in Canada (since ~2000).
Is this a uniquely Canadian challenge? The Statistics Canada article links to an IMF book chapter discussing the world-wide downward trend in productivity growth. That chapter signals this is affecting both advanced economies and developing economies -so Canada is not alone. The IMF paper makes it clear that the global financial crisis had a major impact on business activity and identifies several long-term trends linked to the declining productivity, including fewer people in the labour force, less business investment (due to a variety of factors), and inefficient capital allocation.
While discussions about productivity may be somewhat inside-baseball, the IMF points to the strong negative consequences the world can expect if productivity cannot be raised. Here at home, if Canada’s programs supporting business R&D are not resulting in measurable improvements in Canadian productivity, what does this mean for government support for R&D?
#innovation #innovationPolicy #productivity #Canada #NSERC
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1yAnd yet, NSERC only supports 150k$/year a industry pull project with colleges and polytechnic institutes. Why 1000k$/year for an university push project (Alliance) and 150k$/year for an industry pull project with a college (ARD)? It’s not very DEI. Furthermore colleges are excluded from special initiatives like in quantum science. Grant access and amounts should be for the project quality and not the academics titles. 1M$ a year to any institution with a great project.
Independent Director at PTAC
1yThanks, Bert. If the "series of matched-company studies that consistently showed that NSERC’s partnership programs were among the most impactful of the Federal government’s innovation programs." are 'ground-proofing' then it's hard to argue that NSERC's R&D Partnerships programs do not help abate, if not turn around Canada's persistent productivity decline, which is egregious and puts Canada at the bottom of the G-7. Numerous studies have shown that R&D investment, productivity-focused capital and software investments correlate with productivity improvement/GDP and the US and other G-7 nations are out-investing and out-performing Canada. NSERC's Partnership Programs are beneficial to Canada in numerous, mutually reinforcing ways: * The R&D is driven by the partner company's commercial priorities * Corporate R&D investment is increased over what it otherwise would be * The Corporate partner 'pulls the technology' out of the lab with the intention of commercializing it (commercialization of new technology id the definition of innovation) * Corporate receptor capacity for adoption on new technology is enhanced * Highly qualified personnel (HQP) are created and trained to fill industry's craving for HQP to implement innovations.
Strategic advice for research and innovation policy
1y1) Understanding Canada’s innovation paradox: Exploring linkages between innovation, technology adoption and productivity by Guy Gellatly and Wulong Gu 2) Chapter 3: Slowdown In Global Medium-Term Growth: What Will It Take To Turn the Tide? On July 31st, Re$earchMoney published a (paywalled) article that re-digests the Statistics Canada article, a related presentation, and the IMF’s chapter about productivity trends. However, the Statistics Canada article and presentation are both short and quite readable.