Q&A With Enterprise Saskatchewan

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By Tonya Costoff

We asked and you responded. Readers gave us their thoughts on what they think the Canadian government needs to be doing when it comes to biotech.

In a follow-up to our September 2008 Hot Button issue, Biotechnology Focus once again spoke to readers asking for their comments and thoughts on what they believe the hot button issues are in the Canadian biotech industry. Readers commented on such things as where they think Canada is lagging behind, what the industry needs from government in order to succeed and whether they believe the government is listening.

Here’s a round-up of what you, the readers, had to say:

So what exactly can we pull from the survey? Quite a bit actually. Many readers had some very positive comments about the life sciences field and feel it just needs a bit of attention, but there are also a large amount out there that feel we are at a crossroads right now and government needs to act quickly, before it’s too late.

Biotechnology Focus found a number of the reader’s responses to be extremely interesting. We’d like to share some of the most thought provoking ideas/comments/thoughts with you in hopes that it may generate more conversation and challenge people to keep forging ahead and making the Canadian life sciences industry the best it can be.

Your Comments:
• “Canada needs to focus on turning our great research into commercially viable companies”
• “Canada’s competitive edge is slipping away, while other regions are ramping up big time!”
• “I would like to see the government allocate more money/funding to support research projects.”
• “The country is not producing high quality researchers and the few good ones leave for better pastures.”
• “We need strong support for basic science research.”
• “Canada needs to provide a favourable tax regime that encourages investment in the long term and discourages takeovers, which simply export the technology to the USA.”
• “Canada is importing too much compared to what the country is exporting.”
• “We need to build a reputation as a developer, rather than a researcher of new technologies.”

Q&A With Enterprise Saskatchewan

Biotechnology Focus recently sat down with Dale Botting, CEO of Enterprise Saskatchewan to pick his brain on what the organization is doing, why it’s working and why other province’s may want to follow its lead.

Through its regional offices, Enterprise Saskatchewan provides business and co-operative development support through assessment, information, pathfinding and referral services.

Q: What sets Enterprise Saskatchewan apart?

Dale Botting: “One of the keys to Enterprise Saskatchewan was being a sector driven type of agency. We established 18 sector teams of all the key sector specialists, largely in the private sector but sometimes in research organizations as well, who would give us additional advice sector by sector, identify current barriers to growth, longer term strategic opportunities and key metrics as we track the sectors.”

Q: How did you identify these “sectors”?

Dale Botting: ““We went to the industries and asked the industries themselves to identify key talent. We had nominations also open for individual citizens to express interest if they wanted to be part of our sector teams. Largely it is a volunteer effort but people have stepped forward because they all want to participate in this new shared governance approach towards economic development.”

“We’ve also established what we call a Strategic Issues Council. There are certain issues that transcend individual sector interests, we’ve got two up and running so far. We’re looking at the modernization of the regulatory process. We also have a council that is now formed on entrepreneurship, looking at various policy instruments to enhance and grow an entrepreneurial culture in Saskatchewan.

We are also creating new enterprise regions, more of a regional economical model. We’ve made them a little larger in regional scope, we wanted to look a little more at labour market planning, infrastructure needs. Too often in the past they were very narrow and community-based.”

Q: What makes this model a good model to follow?

Dale Botting: “We have invented some processes that make us fairly flexible. We don’t have to go through some of the red tape that line departments would have to go through to mobilize community support.

It’s not just an advisory body, we do implement direct services on behalf of the whole province. The chair of our board, who is one of only two government people on our 12 person board - which is pretty gutsy to turn it over to that level of private sector engagement, is also the chair and minister of the Economic Development Committee of Cabinet. That creates a cross-functional alignment so that we’re not just advising but we can also align to his dual leadership the appropriate contacts inside government so we can get the best of both worlds.”

For a full list of the programs and services Enterprise Saskatchewan offers, as well as more information on the organization, visit www.ei.gov.sk.ca.