The science of today is the economy of tomorrow

When the federal government introduced the Canada First Research Excellence Fund (CFREF) in late 2014, its aim was to propel research at the country’s universities from world-class to world-leading. Nearly a decade later, and with $1.4-billion in support announced last month, the program’s foresight is clear. Complex global issues have multiplied, and investing in big, advanced and collaborative science is more critical than ever to addressing urgent challenges such as climate change. As the Task Force on American Innovation has argued, research funding builds national economic advantages and sovereignty. Our closest allies and competitors are doing no less, whether through generational investments in clean technology as we see in the United States, or globally leading plays in quantum technologies as we see in China’s spending, among the world’s highest as a percentage of GDP. Canada has many strengths in this new strategic race, including unparalleled access to talent, an increasingly successful commercialization pipeline from researchers to business, and a federal government focused on developing the industries of tomorrow. As Innovation, Science and Economic Development Minister François-Philippe Champagne said when announcing an impressive and visionary list of CFREF winners from across the country: “The science of today is the economy of tomorrow.” We don’t always know when tomorrow will arrive, when investments in science will translate to measurable prosperity. That makes supporting frontier science more challenging, but no less important. The University of Toronto’s Acceleration Consortium (AC) is a prime example of frontier science with tremendous promise for economic gains. At almost $200-million, the latest CFREF is the largest U of T has ever received, a recognition of the potential its research has to improve human lives, from addressing climate change to new therapies and drugs. Its success now and in future has been built on earlier waves of investment and research in AI, robotics, materials science and health sciences, which the AC is combining to create solutions at speed and scale. At the same time, stagnating support for research at our universities threatens to undermine these institutions as foundations for competitiveness. Without reinvestment, both home-grown and global talent will look elsewhere, jeopardizing one of the country’s advantages. These are the leaders who will scale new companies and attract other talent from around the world in advanced fields such as biomanufacturing, clean technology, and quantum and artificial intelligence. And they are in increasingly high demand due to a new era of science-based industrial strategy being pursued by governments, nowhere more so than in the United States. The U.S. CHIPS and Science Act—US$280-billion in total, with $81-billion dedicated to the National Science Foundation, doubling its budget over five years—is predicted to be an engine of job creation and talent attraction. Yet the Report of the Advisory Panel on the Federal Research Support System found that Canada's investment in the people running this global race is falling behind that of comparable jurisdictions—like Japan, the United Kingdom, Germany and the U.S.— and that grant and stipend levels for emerging researchers are not competitive with those in leading countries. Whether through scholarships for students or grants to principal investigators whose work supports trainees, our best and brightest would often do better elsewhere. Finally, new technologies must serve human goals. Here, Canadian researchers are leading the way in demonstrating how to harness science for the greater good. The AC, for example, has put ethical concerns are at the centre of its work, from an equity, diversity and inclusion framework to inform trainee development, to integrating Indigenous researchers who will evaluate the impact of new materials. In the past decade, the federal government has demonstrated it believes investment in research translates to economic growth. The Pan-Canada AI Strategy in 2017 is a case in point, as government support for research catalyzed an AI industry that created tens of thousands of jobs across the country. Research strategies in genomics, life sciences, and quantum have since followed. The Advisory Panel made clear that to be counted among the ranks of science superpowers, Canada must scale such strategic missions while also reinvesting in investigator-led, discovery research. This is an industrial strategy for the 21st century, pairing prosperity with a university system that is leading edge on talent and research and committed to deploying those assets to benefit all. Professor Leah Cowen is vice-president of Research and Innovation and Strategic Initiatives at the University of Toronto, co-director of the fungal kingdom program at the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, and chief scientific officer at Bright Angel Therapeutics.

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The science of today is the economy of tomorrow

Complex global issues have multiplied, and investing in big, advanced and collaborative science is more critical than ever to addressing urgent challenges.

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