Ontario government is Canada’s biggest R&D spender, outstripping Quebec in 2002

The Ontario government surpassed its Quebec counterpart in R&D spending in FY01-02 for the first time in recent history, and preliminary data show the trend continuing in FY02-03. In FY01-02, the Ontario government spent $443.5 million, rising to $488.7 million in FY02-03. That compared to Quebec, whose government had expenditures in those years of $426.4 million and $413.0 million respectively.

Quebec government spending peaked in FY99-00 at $455.0 million when Ontario’s expenditures were just $280.8 million. Of all the provinces for which there are data (6), Ontario and Alberta show the strongest R&D spending growth. Alberta spent $268.0 million in FY02-03, compared to just $106.1 million by the BC government. The latter has declined steeply from a high of $199.9 million in FY00-01. Manitoba shows modest increases while Saskatchewan’s has dropped slightly.

The data were contained in the latest report on scientific and technological activities of provincial governments from Statistics Canada. The report provides valuable information on provincial spending patterns but the data is far from comprehensive. StatsCan is hostage to the reporting capabilities of the provinces, and many do not provide a full suite of data on S&T outlays. Quebec collects only R&D data while the Atlantic provinces no longer provide R&D or S&T data of any kind. And in FY02-03, Saskatchewan appears to have stopped generating R&D data.

Quebec remains the province with the highest rate of R&D expenditures as a percentage of gross domestic product in Canada while Ontario continues to be home to the largest amount of R&D (see chart).

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