Budget 2.0 Supports Innovation [reprise]

Today's federal budget is a reprise of the applied research and innovation supports and continues the important work Canada's colleges and polytechnics do to support industry innovation. Notably, new funding is as outlined in the first iteration of the budget:

• $80M in new funding for IRAP to link businesses with colleges
• Supporting 30 new Industrial Research Chairs at colleges with $3 million in 2011–12 and $5 million a year on a permanent basis starting in 2012–13.
• Allocating $12 million over five years, starting in 2011–12, through the Idea to Innovation program to support joint college-university commercialization projects.

Both the ACCC and Polytechnics Canada have worked hard with our industry partners to show the value proposition that college and polytechnic applied research brings to the Canadian innovation system. These are important structural changes that will have positive downstream social and economic productivity effects.

As an  enabler of the innovation economy, George Brown College is committed to supporting business innovation, and will be utilizing these new funding opportunities to further help build a robust and complementary innovation system in Canada.

More on the Multiplier Effect

As per recent posts on the multiplier effect, an entire workforce with innovation literacy puts complementary skills to work on common innovation issues. Students develop innovation skills  through applied research project work as linked to workforce skills and education. The articulation of workforce skills development and innovation literacy is made in the OECD report on Workforce Skills and Innovation referenced here in earlier posts (this report is a must-read for anyone engaged in education and innovation). The Globe and Mail today published the Report on Campus Research 2011, which includes many good stories on applied research at Canadian colleges, and basic research from our universities. The online version has a few other stories, including an interview I did in "How Canada can get more R&D bang for its buck." I refer to the multiplier effect of using granting council funding for the development of HQSP to more broadly spur the diffusion of innovation. The point here is that we need STEM and nonSTEM working together. We can expand the idea of the multiplier effect - which I've previously used this to refer to graduate and undergraduate students with innovation literacy working together for improved productivity - to include the idea of adding value to work teams via multidisciplinary collaborative problem solving. This point is alluded to in Budget 2011, where funding for both NSERC and SSHRC can work together to promote the college research chairs through a mixture of business and technical skill-sets oriented to applied research problem solving.

Innovation, entrepreneurship and future-proofing Canadian productivity

I've just returned from the ACCC Applied Research Symposium, which featured excellent discussions, dialog and debate on the state of college applied research, our collaborative efforts at building our capacity, and how we can work together - and with other actors in the Canadian innovation system - to ensure growth in Canadian productivity. This is the third year I've attended the symposium, and I am very impressed with how we've come together. Innovation support continues to evolve across the college sector.

Panelists and presenters gave delegates a good overview of policy needs as well as practical measures that will build system capacity and let us show our strengths in supporting business innovation. The Symposium was nicely foregrounded against the Budget backdrop, which recognizes the key role colleges play in supporting the diffusion of innovation across the country. As the highlights in my last post show, the recognition achieved in the Budget is a strong signal of the applied research advantage offered by colleges and polytechnics. As I've noted earlier, our advantage is our ability to integrate and link workforce education and innovation literacy. The ACCC and Polytechnics Canada press releases show the value proposition we offer to Canadian innovation.

The ACCC Symposium featured speakers from NSERC, SSHRC and CFI, all of whom spoke about the crucial support these granting councils give to the college applied research sector. The Innovation Enhancement Program (formerly CCIP) administered by NSERC on behalf of the Tri-Council is a key vehicle for developing the applied research capacity in Canada. The CFI's new College Industry Innovation Program, launched last December, is helping us to collectively modernize the Canadian college system while building industry innovation support linked closely with education. SSHRC is a key vehicle for linking applied research and business innovation with downstream social and economic productivity improvement. Innovation is a social act, and it is the human sciences that enable us to bridge technical disciplines with business and entrepreneurship--and to develop "user-oriented" participatory innovation with wide applicability.

The Budget shows we all have a role in ensuring that Canada remains competitive and productivity increases. Key here is the development of innovation and entrepreneurship skills - people-centred innovation and the balancing of STEM and non-STEM skills and attributes essential to building a healthy and robust innovation economy in Canada. More on this in the days and weeks to come: the development of an entire workforce with innovation literacy requires an "and" approach - not a zero-sum this-or-that approach, but rather this and that--complementary research capacity working to build complementary skill-sets to future-proof Canadian productivity.

Budget 2011 has strong support for applied research, complementarity

Budget 2011 includes many measures that will strengthen Canada's capacity to compete by leveraging the college and polytechnic applied research layer of the Canadian innovation system. I'll post details and analysis later, but for now here is a highlight:

• Strong focus on investments in education and R&D, following leading OECD indicators
• $80M in new funding for IRAP to link businesses with colleges
• $37M each year ongoing for the Tri-Council
• $10M for Indirect Costs
• Most significantly: Supporting 30 new Industrial Research Chairs at colleges with $3 million in 2011–12 and $5 million a year on a permanent basis starting in 2012–13.
• Allocating $12 million over five years, starting in 2011–12, through the Idea to Innovation program to support joint college-university commercialization projects.
• Good support for international applied research through a Canada-India Research Centre of Excellence, linked to an international education strategy
• Digital Economy strategy supports, including for business innovation and content creation