Well, IP is definitely becoming a pivotal issue for the growth of the Canadian aerospace industry, and I will speak to two aspects of that. One of them is under the commercial funding agreements of programs such as SADI, and the other is with respect to government procurement.
There are four major issues with large impact. The restrictive IP policies of certain programs like SADI limit the collaboration across borders, as the IP is deemed the property of Government of Canada. As Maryse said, the new aerospace programs are the result of collaborative efforts, and international partners require sharing of IP. Therefore, our industry is at a great disadvantage because of the fact that IP is restricted to the government.
It also stifles commercial exploitation for some foreign companies that have subsidiaries in Canada. Very often they're at a disadvantage with their sister companies when they bid internally for world product mandates, because they don't have the right to use the technology outside Canada. Also, it's very difficult for our companies to implement competitive industrial strategies because they cannot get work done in other countries where there are low-cost sources, and therefore they're at a cost-competitive disadvantage.
The last, but also extremely important, issue is in terms of government procurements or federal acquisitions of foreign aircraft. Very often government does not negotiate the rights to the IP that give the high value-added work to the companies, and this work is kept by the primes in their own countries. Our SMEs particularly are at a great disadvantage, because they don't have access to this IP because government does not negotiate it at the front end.
There are a number of solutions. Certainly there have to be optimal and consistent IP guidelines across all government departments, and we have to reduce the restrictions on programs. We have to be much more open so that we can meet the demands of other countries, and we have to reinforce our procurement policies by negotiating upfront access to IP, which is so necessary to create more of these high-value jobs that the industry already provides.
Thank you very much.