Mr. Chair and members of the committee, I will fly through the other two recommendations. I think you probably have our speaking notes, and I won't repeat what you can already read for yourself.
The second recommendation has to do with the support of the federal government for a program for post-doctoral fellows. Currently there are a number of programs that the federal government has, both for graduate students and for academics, whether it be the Canada research chairs, the Vanier scholarship for doctoral students, or whatever. One important part of the research composition that needs support consists of post-doctoral fellows. There are currently about 6,000 of them in Canada, although the number is soft because they are counted in different ways. There needs to be a program both to support the functions within the research enterprise as well as to attract the best scholars to the country. We have quantified this as a program of about 1,000 scholars at a level of about $60,000 per person.
The second aspect has to do with trying to provide seed money as well as targeted support for international partnerships for Canadian research networks. These are not limited to universities but include partnerships between universities, industries, and governments across the world in order to make sure that Canada is an important player in international research consortiums and is able to maximize the strengths we have within this country.
I can speak about this more in questions, but I know your time is limited.