Thank you, Madam Chair.
Good afternoon. Thank you to the committee for having me back. It's a pleasure to appear before you today as part of your study on artificial intelligence.
As a member of Minister Solomon's AI strategy task force, my colleagues and I engaged in extensive and far-reaching consultations with research centres, universities, public institutions, industry, and thought leaders across the country. Much of what we heard informs the federal government's strategy to shape a responsible AI research ecosystem, and I look forward to sharing these insights with you today.
As the birthplace for deep learning, Canada is uniquely positioned to lead in AI research. While it is apparent that AI has the potential to fundamentally transform our economy and society, it is less certain how this will happen. We must remain a leader in developing the underlying foundational techniques, and the mechanisms to leverage these techniques, for the benefit of Canadians, while ensuring that any and all AI systems remain ethical, fair and transparent.
Canadians must see their place in the AI revolution, garnering the skills to navigate the emerging changes in industry, civil society and government. For Canada to harness the potential of AI while managing its challenges, we must demand excellence in mission-driven research and the talent to shape and translate our research into globally competitive technologies, innovations and products.
Today, I'd like to share with the committee a number of observations from my consultations with the Canadian research community and with industry writ large.
Research and talent are the bedrock of our national AI strategy. AI continues to evolve rapidly, and Canada can only benefit if we maintain our AI thought leadership. We cannot be successful without an expansive talent pool, trained to apply the latest AI techniques, helping to implement AI to address our socio-economic opportunities and challenges. This will require taking an inclusive approach to training, from ensuring widespread understanding and appreciation of AI to ensuring that the best and brightest are attracted to Canada, ready to contribute to Canadian AI excellence.
Our AI strategy must ensure that Canadians see that AI can benefit them. The time is now to develop training and skills programs that ensure Canadians have the ability to garner the skills that allow them to adopt and thrive during future AI disruptions. Canadians must have confidence that senior business leaders have necessary AI competencies to navigate these disruptions thoughtfully. Governments must ensure appropriate social safety nets to allow Canadians to adjust to these disruptions.
All levels of government must identify strategic AI priorities and ensure that resources are directed to those priorities. Rapid changes in the AI landscape, combined with geopolitical realities, mean that rather than taking a “peanut butter” approach to policy-making, government must prioritize national strengths in AI while ensuring AI is broadly diffused so that Canadians benefit.
We will need a multidisciplinary, multisectoral approach to develop multi-use AI-based systems that can address multiple socio-economic challenges. We heard that truly inspired AI solutions can be applied across multiple disciplines and economic sectors. For example, privacy-enabling techniques developed for health care can be translated into techniques and applications for public service, education or finance.
We must ensure a national focus on building and deploying AI-enabled technologies for strategic Canadian sectors. There are sectors that are critical for the future of the country, such as national defence. There are sectors where Canada is a world leader, such as resource extraction. There are sectors where Canada is uniquely positioned to succeed, such as health care, and sectors where Canada can become a critical player in the global supply chain, such as microelectronics and robotics. For these sectors to grow and become globally competitive, we must adopt a national focus that enables the development of breakthrough technologies.
We heard that too many Canadian economic strategies mimic those of other countries, especially the United States, rather than build on this country's economic realities and competitive advantages. Getting this right and bolstering our strategic strengths can significantly boost GDP in the near term, allowing for new AI-inspired industries to emerge that build a brighter economic future that benefits all Canadians.
Issues pertaining to AI sovereignty were mentioned by nearly all stakeholders. Some noted that developing sovereign compute strategies is tricky given rapid obsolescence and massive investments by the U.S. and the EU, which make it difficult for Canada to keep pace. Canada will need to be strategic in its compute investments by, for example, investing in sovereign compute for highly strategic needs such as the pursuit of advanced AI research, while utilizing shared compute for day-to-day corporate needs.
Building on this, there is widespread recognition that we need a sovereign data strategy that ensures—