Newfoundland’s innovation strategy seen as key to boosting province’s innovative capacity

Newfoundland is putting the final touches on an innovation strategy that – along with the recently release White Paper on Post-Secondary Education – could significantly increase the province’s R&D performance and levels of innovative activity. Currently ranked near the bottom of most indicators for measuring R&D and competitiveness, provincial fortunes have risen recently with economic activity stemming from the burgeoning oil and gas sector and the Atlantic Accord, which gives the provinces a greater share of the sector’s revenues.

The innovation strategy is expected to receive a public release this fall and will address five objectives: increase community and economic competitiveness in all regions; attract new investments; leverage federal investment; advance knowledge-based developments; and, build an overall culture of innovation.

Coinciding with the strategy is the recently release White Paper, which essentially covers the province’s one university, one college, post-secondary system — Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) and College of the North Atlantic. Of its 28 recommendations, two focus on post-secondary research capacity. The first – already implemented in the most recent provincial Budget – calls for $22.5 million over three years for the Industry Research and Innovation Fund (IRIF) beginning in FY05-06. IRIF is the fund used to match federal co-funding programs, primarily the Canada Foundation for Innovation. The second recommendation advocates discussions with the federal government to secure adequate funding for the indirect costs of research supported by the granting councils.

The commitment to IRIF stems from recommendations made by MUN, which accounts for more than 60% of Newfoundland’s R&D activity, reaching $80 million in total research funding in FY04-05. MUN has made impressive gains in R&D performance in the past five years, and IRIF will permit continued growth should the institution continue to win major CFI awards.

“The amount is based on our best estimates. The government agreed to our numbers and it will go a long way towards meeting our needs for growing research,” says Dr Christopher Loomis, MUN’s VP research. “The IRIF and federal programs have helped us to be more effective and the government has realized that. MUN is a resource that has not been fully tapped.”

With a course of action determined for each of the White Paper’s recommendation, attention is now turning to the innovation strategy, which has been developed with the assistance of AMEC Earth & Environmental Services. Consultations were carried out with every industrial sector in every region of the province through early 2005, culminating in a pan-provincial session in St John’s March 14th. When it is released, it will mark the first time the province has developed such a strategy.

“This strategy has the potential to be extremely important, almost critical to the province. There’s never been this level of activity at such a high or broad a level. We’re all quite encouraged by the efforts of the government,” says Loomis. “It has not been afraid to take on the challenge (of confronting the province’s urban-rural divide). There’s never been a coordinated strategy before so it’s been hard to integrate with the federal vision of innovation except on an ad hoc, program-by-program basis. New Brunswick has already done this and has been the most effective in Atlantic Canada”

Despite the determination to improve competitiveness and innovation, the population of Newfoundland continues to shrink. Out-migration has caused the population to decrease 10% between 1991 and 2001 to about 500,000, with those between the ages of 15 and 34 leaving in the highest numbers. The White Paper claims that individuals leaving the province “typically have higher education levels than the general population” but Loomis says that’s simply not the case.

”There’s no evidence that highly qualified personnel (HQP) are leaving. A recent MUN graduate survey showed that 70% of graduates are living and working in Newfoundland,” says Loomis. “ When I tell this to people they are aghast but it shows that the higher the education, the higher the probability people will stay in Newfoundland.”

OIL & GAS

If there’s any single factor that could turn the province’s fortunes around, it’s the emergence of the oil and gas sector. Newfoundland’s reserves have brought industry to the island and the recent Atlantic Accord means billion in new revenues could flow into provincial coffers. MUN has responded by focusing on areas of relevant research and technology.

“Oil and gas R&D is a major component of the direction we’ve taken at MUN. R&D is huge in figuring out how to prolong the lifetime of reserves. We have a new visualization centre that uses seismic data to look at petroleum reserves in three dimensions,” says Loomis. “Oil and gas represent an opportunity to fund government R&D and incent business. The Atlantic Accord is a real opportunity and the government recognizes that the time we have to do this (stimulate innovation) is relatively short-lived. The government has resources at its disposal to enable transformation and that’s a huge step. Newfoundland is where Alberta was in the 1950s when oils and gas was just beginning.”

The new innovation strategy has the potential to ensure that the impact of oil and gas has a lasting effect, with benefits that spread throughout the economy.

“MUN has thought a lot about future actions it can take to stimulate research and innovation and commercialization but we’re limited by receptor capacity and the government must address this,” says Loomis. “We need to create an environment that’s conducive for industry to conduct R&D and the HQP to partner with companies in areas of global opportunity.”

R$