Jerry Cook Editor, MPP jcook@clbmedia.ca

Canada underachieves in global classroom

Canada is a gifted country that continues to underachieve in many critical areas including the economy and innovation, according to the Conference Board of Canada’s recent annual benchmarking report.

“This year’s report card on Canada tells the story of a gifted country underperforming in almost all subjects. For quite a few years, the Conference Board has been sounding the alarm that Canada is slipping to the back of the gifted class, and that future prosperity is at risk.

“That’s a hard argument to make in a country enjoying low unemployment, a strong dollar, declining debt, and a booming resource economy. Canadians tend to be skeptical of an argument that points to serious challenges ahead and makes an urgent case for strategic investment today to ensure sustainable prosperity tomorrow,” the board warns in its report.

Continues the report, “Yet Canadians see the impact of the world economy on their quality of life in almost every day’s headlines, and are acutely conscious of developments abroad-whether in the economy, innovation, the environment, education and skills, health, or society. For lessons in what Canada might do better and what should be avoided, it is necessary to look out to the rest of the world.”

The report entitled, “How Canada Performs 2008: A Report Card on Canada,” is published annually and benchmarks Canada’s performance relative to that of 17 industrialized countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in six major areas including Innovation, Economy, Environment, Education and Skills, Health, and Society.

The news for Canada, however, isn’t good, notes the board. In the most recent report card, Canada receives “B” grades on its economic, education, health, and social performance, but a “C” on environmental performance and a “D” on innovation. “In almost every major category of socio-economic performance studied, Canada’s performance is slipping, causing it to fall behind countries that are its peers, partners, and competitors.

“The rules of the game have changed. In a global economy, with global supply chains-where companies spread production around the globe in search of higher efficiency and lower costs for each component of the final product, and compete vigorously for international investment and trade-Canada needs to do better not only in absolute terms but also relative to others,” the report states.

For example, the report points out that in the 1970s, the Canadian economy ranked 3rd amongst the 17 peer countries but the new report shows Canada has slipped to 11th place. “Most troubling is that Canada’s ranking on income per capita-a measure often used as an indicator of a country’s standard of living or prosperity-has dropped significantly.

“In the early 1970s, Canada’s standard of living was the envy of most countries in the world, with its income per capita ranking behind only Switzerland, the U.S., and Sweden. The latest benchmarking results show that five additional countries have moved ahead of Canada-Norway, Ireland, the Netherlands, Austria, and Denmark,” the Conference Board says.

According to the report, there are three specific trends causing Canada to lose ground. “First, Canada is a chronic laggard on several important economic indicators, such as productivity. Second, even in some areas where Canada’s performance has improved, its peer countries are doing better, thus raising the standard for quality of life. Third, Canada has failed to keep pace in the growing competition for global investment.”

Likewise, Canada continues to lag behind global competitors when it comes to innovation. “Canada is well supplied with good universities, engineering schools, teaching hospitals, and technical institutes. It produces science that is well respected around the world. But, with some exceptions, Canada does not take the steps that other countries take to ensure science can be successfully commercialized and used as a source of advantage for innovative companies seeking global market share. Canadian companies are thus rarely at the leading edge of new technology and too often find themselves a generation or more behind the productivity growth achieved by global industry leaders,” the report says.

Although Canada is trailing some of the other performers in the class, we still have time to learn our lessons and bring home a better report card next time.

NAIT opens machinist centre

The Northern Alberta Institute of Technology (NAIT), Edmonton, AB recently opened the Sandvik Coromant Centre for Machinist Technology.

The new centre was named in recognition of a $2-million donation from Sandvik Coromant Canada, Mississauga, ON. Sandvik, headquartered in Sweden, is NAIT’s first European-based funding partner.

From left to right: Patrick Machacek, associate vice-President, Advancement & Communications with NAIT, Bob Skodzinsky (manager, North American Haas Technical Education Centre Program with Haas Automation), Paul Krainer, president, Thomas Skinner & Son, Stewart Cook, chair, Machinist Program, NAIT, and George Andrew, vice-president, External Relations & CDO, NAIT.

Sandvik Coromant’s investment, which includes in-kind equipment donations and support of student awards, helps ensure NAIT machinist apprentices are learning on the most technologically advanced tools available. According to NAIT, the Sanadvik Coromant Centre for Machinst Technology has increased the institute’s capacity to train apprentices by 50%.

“Sandvik Coromant’s business philosophy is a good fit with NAIT’s approach to learning,” says NAIT President and CEO Dr. Sam Shaw. “Sandvik Coromant invests twice as much each year in research and development as the average company in their industry. Using innovation and technology to solve manufacturing problems and to improve productivity is exactly what NAIT is trying to foster through applied research.”

Brian Philip, senior manager, business and productivity development, with Sandvik Coromant says the company was proud to work with NAIT to create the new machinist centre.

“By improving student knowledge of the metal-cutting process with new equipment, this donation to NAIT will help create a recruitment base of skilled personnel-not only for customers within Alberta and Canada's manufacturing industry, but also for Sandvik Coromant Canada,” says Philip.

The opening of the new Sandvik machinist centre also marked the creation of a Haas Technical Educational Centre showroom (HTEC) within the Sandvik machinist centre. “To say this showroom is impressive is an understatement” says Paul Krainer, president of Thomas Skinner & Son Ltd., Richmond, BC, the Western Canadian distributor for Haas. “With 36 Haas machines for students to train on, this HTEC will help provide Canada with the skilled workers so desperately needed by our economy. We are honored to be a part of NAIT’s continuing development to improve the education of Canadians.”

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June 2008 Digital Edition

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