Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you very much for inviting me to appear before you today.
I will start by providing you with a little bit of an overview of our industry and the context in which we operate. My colleague, Lucie Boily, will talk about the precise challenges we face.
The Aerospace Industries Association represents both aeronautics and space manufacturers and service providers. The industry employs about 80,000 Canadians across the nation. There are about 150,000 indirect and direct jobs. About 15,000 to 20,000 engineering and scientific staff work in this industry, so it's a very high-level, high-knowledge industry. It has yearly revenues of about $22 billion and exports of 73% to 75%. Investment in R and D is about $2 billion per year.
Our companies are evolving in the changing global context. We must adapt if we want to remain competitive. The industry, as you may well know, is highly globalized in nature. We have very long and costly R and D cycles. It's an industry in which there is no margin for error, basically. It is very capital intensive. To win world mandates, tier 1 and tier 2 suppliers must take on some risk, do design and engineering, and develop some IP, as well.
In terms of the industry's vision and opportunities, the Canadian aerospace industry has a clear vision: given the outstanding growth in commercial aircraft and space technologies around the world, we want to grow our market share. The expected growth is $3.4 trillion for commercial aircraft. We are talking about 34,000 new aircraft in just the commercial aircraft aspect.
If Canada is to remain competitive, we want to grow. We want to grow across the nation. To do that, we're going to need some policies and programs, including IP policies, that evolve with us and allow us to be competitive.
How do we capture and increase our current market share? We need strategic and early positioning on new aircraft platforms that are going to be flying in the near future. We're going to have to move up and into the global supply chain and make sure that our companies do, including small and medium-size companies. We're going to have to make sure that we increase the design capability of mid-size companies and that we enhance our international collaboration to increase our R and D intensity across the value chain.
On global pressures and their impact on IP management, every other nation interested in attracting R and D and aerospace has very aggressive mechanisms in place to attract foreign investment, which means flexible IP policies, among other things. It also means access to specific markets that are increasingly linked to local investment in those markets. Therefore, if we want to access several large markets, we must sometimes locate some work in those markets to win mandates and have access to those markets. That is the reality now.
Cost pressures from airline operators, of course, have an impact on our cost reduction in terms of the production of systems and parts.
We need to have new ways of measuring success in the aerospace industry. It's really about the creation of high-level, sustainable employment. We need new market penetration. We have to be more diversified. The development of world product mandates on major aircraft and the development and commercialization of new technologies is how we are going to define our success and keep our competitive edge. The growth of our industry, in terms of revenue and export, will certainly come from continued excellence in technology and IP generation.