Industry committee  Thank you very much. I'd like to add a few words on education, because it's a key issue. There are indeed many avenues to be dealt with. It should really begin in elementary schools. Education in this area is needed to develop future talent. Second, work is needed with post-secondary institutions because it's important to develop talent to meet industry needs.

Industry committee  It is clear that it's best to work with our trade partners, actually, and that's not only the United States and Mexico. Let's not forget the CETA with Europe as well. Specifically, they developed this MiCA regulation, and I think we can leverage lots of these aspects, and maybe go beyond it, creating the regulatory sandboxes that are necessary.

Industry committee  Maybe I can add a little. The study we did back in 2020 indicated that there were approximately 16,000 in the workforce in Canada. With the CAGR at the time.... In fact, even in 2017 we estimated that it was growing by 33% year over year. We definitely need a more in-depth analysis of this market.

Industry committee  Thank you. If you look at the example of the market and the regulations in Europe in terms of markets and crypto-assets, they looked at utility tokens. They actually left Bitcoins and Ethereum out of this outlook. They looked at utility tokens and stablecoins and NFTs, specifically if they fractionalized, because then they become a security.

Industry committee  Good afternoon. Thank you for the introduction. I want to begin by thanking you for this opportunity to address the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry and Technology as part of its study on blockchains. My name is Namir Anani. I am the president and CEO of the Information and Communications Technology Council, the ICTC.

Human Resources committee  I don't think we have anything specific on that.

Human Resources committee  I think this environment is changing at such a dramatic pace that whatever we know today is not whatever is coming out tomorrow. I keep saying that the iPad 1, which we think of as ancient technology, came out in March 2010, which is not that long ago. The reality is there should be some better forecasting from the industry in terms of the job needs of tomorrow.

Human Resources committee  I'm sorry; I didn't hear the question.

Human Resources committee  I think education at the early stages of the game is very important. I did highlight that. In high school it's very important to give them not only the technical but also the business and analytical communication skills. Part of our role, as I mentioned, is that at the moment we have programs trying to cater to that and build industry support into that as much as academic support.

Human Resources committee  I'll start. There is another dimension that is going to compound the premise of our presentation in saying that we know the demand far exceeds supply and by 2016 there will be 160,000 jobs that will need to be filled. It's the emerging sectors of the ICT environment—the mobile, the cloud—and the creative content environment is going to add to this.

Human Resources committee  That's a fact for all sector councils.

Human Resources committee  Some of the funding has been affected. I joined the organization approximately three and a half months ago, but I know that it took effect approximately a year ago. We're looking at other sources of funding from the industry and we're making inroads. The purpose of our presentation today is in terms of what we need going forward, so we're not looking at the funding aspect.

Human Resources committee  Sure.

Human Resources committee  From our point of view, we believe there should be more internship and co-op programs initiated by the industry. A closer focus on attracting that talent early in the game, even at the high school level, and attracting them into the ICT domain is going to be key going forward.

Human Resources committee  Maybe I'll start to attack your question. Clearly, it's a very valid remark that you're making, because the current national occupation code that we have, which represents approximately 14 classifications, doesn't take account of the future and evolving environment. I talked about the SMEs, and we talked about the creative content and all the mobility.