Facing what he described as a “bewildering” array of options, the Canadian Prime Minister’s national science advisor, Arthur Carty, said his next step will be prioritizing the choices Southern Arizona offers, to identify the best options for partnership between Tucson and Ottawa.

“There are great opportunities for research and development collaboration. So, what we want to look for are areas where there’s real synergy and capitalize on them,” Carty said speaking to a panel of researchers at the Canada/University of Arizona Research and Commercialization Roundtable.

His visit to Tucson, the first by a senior Canadian government official, is the latest event in an ongoing relationship between Canada and Arizona, sponsored by the University of Arizona Science and Technology Park’s Global Advantage program and the Government of Canada’s Trade Commissioner Service, with offices in both Tucson and Phoenix.

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By examining the options, he said his office can help establish the next logical step for his nation as it works to move beyond university-based research to develop an information economy for the 21st century. “We recognize that science is changing. It has become multi-disciplined and globalized. Therefore, we need to enhance international collaboration to meet national and global challenges.”

Carty said this is a fairly new approach for Canada, which has long relied on its enormous national resource reserves to sustain its economy.

“We’re the largest supplier of natural gas and oil to the United States. We have precious metals and, once the industry is fully developed, we’ll be the third largest provider of diamonds in the world,” he said, adding that Canada must move beyond the cyclicality of the resource industry to provide a stable and modern “knowledge-based economy that’s research driven” and provides steady, highly paid work for the nation’s population.

As part of a bipartisan policy to build that economy, Carty said Canada has been making twice the U.S. per capita investment in its universities and their research over the last decade, “to bring the nation’s research facilities and staffs to a level equal to the greatest universities, anywhere in the world.”

With an eight-year budget surplus, he said Canada has had the money to spend, but now, Carty said, “It’s time to capitalize on that.”

For that, he said Canada may need help. “Direct investment in business is flat.” The Canadian Federation for Innovation and other clusters across the nation are attempting to overcome that barrier, “but there’s still more work to be done on that.”

Looking to the United States as an example and a partner, and especially Southern Arizona, Carty said, “Our county is motivated and mobilized to do a better job at turning innovation into commercial products. We’re looking to match our people with people who have entrepreneurial skills. That way, we can get a better handle on what’s needed and do it.”

For Rick Stephenson, Tucson-based consul and trade commissioner for Canada, Carty’s visit was part of a growing recognition that Arizona, especially Southern Arizona, offers an opportunity “to expose him to what’s going on in Tucson, to show him the areas where Canada and Arizona can further its partnership in science, leading to commercialization.”

Arizona is already doing $976 million in exports, primarily electronics and aircraft-related parts and equipment, and $1.5 billion in imports from Canada, also mostly aircraft along with lumber. Therefore, a basis for cooperation already exits, he said. Finding more means understanding the options that are available.

Stephenson said, “There are opportunities here he needed to see if the goal is to go toward a knowledge-based economy and away from a resourced-based economy.”

When it comes to calculating the benefits for the Tucson area, the University of Arizona Science and Technology Park’s director of marketing and international programs, John Grabo, said it will begin with identifying a half-dozen areas where cooperative research will offer the greatest benefit. “Research with an eye to developable products leads to bilateral growth an development. What we’re doing here fits in with our vision of how you create a knowledge-based economy. So, we’ll be looking for the next logical step.”

Contact Philip S. Moore at pmoore@azbiz.com or at (520) 295-4238.