That's a very good question.
I think Canada has done very well on the so-called knowledge advantage, the support for research in public institutions and universities. But we have challenges, as you noted, and one of our major challenges is research and development in industry. We need to do better.
I didn't have time to tell about all the working groups we have, but a very important one is one led by David O'Brien on industry R and D, to review and consider where we are now, benchmark us against the best in the world—and we'll come to that in a minute—and provide advice on any new initiatives, instruments, etc., that different stakeholders, not just government, can undertake for the future.
Some of the major success stories on a global basis include Finland, Korea, and Sweden. In all three, there are very large investments within industry for R and D and commercialization.
Last week I had the honour—it really was an honour—to speak to the European Union committee. I was the keynote speaker in Istanbul on research and technology for development. That is the terminology the Europeans use, which we would call science and technology, or research and innovation. I was invited there, I have to tell you, because of the reputation Canada has in S and T policy and accomplishments. Yes, we have challenges, but we also have accomplishments.
The warm-up speaker before me was the former Prime Minister of Finland, Esko Aho. He spoke for 15 minutes on transforming Finland from a natural-resource-based economy to one that is knowledge-based, a mixed economy. It's not just Nokia, which we all know, just as we do RIM in Canada, but it's also converting forests to value-added products, something in an area Canada has not taken advantage of, other than to produce paper and some other things. He mentioned some of the tools or instruments the Finnish government has used to make this happen and to accelerate its development. I fed that information in to David O'Brien's working group.
There are other best practices elsewhere, but those countries I mentioned really have much to be proud of in terms of what they've done in that regard.
So there is commercialization from an industry perspective: big companies spinning off small companies, small companies being created, and then of course the creation of companies from academia. We've made progress in this regard, but this is an area in which we need to make significant improvements in the coming years.