Briefly, I just wanted to allude to the discussions we had this afternoon regarding science and technology and research in Canada.
I guess we've been involved in several projects. So far, we've predominantly been working with single industry partners and with other multiple research collaborators. Most of the funding has been provided through the western economic partnership agreement that flows from Western Economic Diversification Canada and the Province of Manitoba. We have also been involved in a fairly extensive roadmapping assessment with the National Research Council and the Institute for Aerospace Research. This commenced in 2003 and has been ongoing since.
We've identified key areas in the sector for competitive development. However, we've been unable to move forward and have these projects implemented. These predominantly are pre-competitive collaborative projects with numerous industry partners. We have been unable to find a funding agency to at least underpin some of the costs, and that continues to be an effort.
In terms of recommendations, I know that Industry Canada is going to a second round of review of the program, especially under the strategic aerospace and defence initiative. It's with respect to how that funding can be utilized not only by Canadian industry, from a commercialization standpoint, but also in the form of potential grants for a lot of these larger types of projects.
Also, as I mentioned earlier, there is the comparison between funding from Industry Canada and funding from other organizations, such as Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, to see if there is a similarity or if there are distinct differences. I believe there are differences, and maybe one group can learn from the other.
In terms of other activities, specifically from Manitoba's perspective, we're involved in trying to leverage industrial and regional benefit offsets from major military procurement packages. We would like to see if we could have some additional government involvement, not mainly in sponsorship but involvement in coordinating those activities.
We're also looking, together with the University of Manitoba, at bringing in what's known as a consortium for research and innovation in Canada. This is a program that's revolving at the moment around Quebec universities and the aerospace industry. It is quite effective, and we're looking to try to bring that into Manitoba. There are some nuances, especially in the way NSERC views this organization.
Also, from the university perspective, we're looking at what types of guidance we might have in terms of getting the universities to explore ownership of IP and publication initiatives a bit more to make them more industry friendly. I think that's one of the stumbling blocks in terms of getting industry to participate with our university system.
Finally, we are involved in some large capital-intensive projects with industry. We find that it's fairly difficult to get a good solution, not necessarily from a granting perspective but from the perspective of how projects can be funded. I know there is involvement from the strategic aerospace and defence initiative. But there may be some other mechanisms that could be looked at with these tax initiatives, which would actually bring a considerable amount of funding into our aerospace industry.