Today the Ontario Chamber of Commerce, the Mowat Centre and Leger Marketing released a new report entitled Emerging Stronger: A Transformative Agenda for Ontario. The report addresses many areas of economic opportunity that OES participants have considered at our annual Summit as we collectively seek opportunities that can boost Ontario’s competitive edge in a turbulent and complex global economy.  Please take a look at the paper and share your own thoughts in our comments section below.

For 100 years, the Ontario Chamber of Commerce (OCC) has championed an economic vision for this province and advocated for a more competitive Ontario. Developed in partnership with The Mowat Centre and Leger Marketing, Emerging Stronger: A Transformative Agenda for Ontario outlines a strategic plan for how to best leverage Ontario’s competitive advantages into greater prosperity.

This economic vision serves as a foundation for dialogue with government and civic leaders about opportunities for progress and what Ontario needs to do, but most importantly, what Ontario can become.

Priorities

Emerging Stronger: A Transformative Agenda for Ontario is the result of consultation with Ontario’s business, government and civic leaders (including non-profit, Aboriginal and labour). The priorities identified by these leaders include:

1. Fostering a culture of innovation and smart risk-taking in order to become a productivity leader
2. Building a 21st century workforce through workplace training, utilizing newcomers’ skills and apprenticeship reform
3. Restoring fiscal balance by improving the way government works
4. Taking advantage of new opportunities in the global economy
5. Identifying, championing and investing in our competitive advantages

Thanks to business, government and civic leaders, the Chamber Network and participants of the Ontario Economic Summit who lent their voice to the shaping of this economic vision for Ontario.

Delegates left the 8^th Annual Ontario economic summit with a clear call to action: to empower Ontarians to be smart consumers of healthcare and energy.

We have what it takes in Ontario to maintain and gain leadership in the world: the innovation, the education, the leadership and the talent. We are respected, embraced internationally and effective – sometimes more so in international markets than here at home.

But we need to move faster.

Business, labour, the public sector and non-profit organizations need long-term, thoughtful and enabling policy, and the stability of policy direction to complete what they have started.

After two days of dialogue, strategy sessions and networking, 200 delegates left The Fairmont Royal York Hotel with new knowledge and a commitment to move Towards Ontario’s Next Great Era.

The Summit ended with a willingness and energy among delegates to move forward together in new and innovative ways. “We have work to do, but not many places offer the advantages that exist here in Ontario, said Mary Jo Haddad, President & CEO of SickKids, and Ontario Economic Summit Co-Chair.

In the run-up to the 8th Annual Ontario Economic Summit (OES), the OES team got a chance to interview Parag Khanna, the leading next generation voice on the future of global affairs. Named one of Esquire magazine’s “75 Most Influential People of the 21st Century, you will not want to miss his Summit keynote address “The Next Wave of Globalization” on Tuesday, November 22nd.  

Covering the three key focus areas of this year’s Summit, namely Health Care, Energy and Urban Regions, Parag answered our questions pertaining to the state of the Eurozone and how it might impact Canada. He shared his views on Ontario’s ability to overcome its most pressing challenges in the light of growing global urbanization and even provided his forecast for the future of the U.S. economy.

Take a sneak peak at some of the issues Parag Khanna will address at this year’s Summit and read our full interview.

Sector leaders from across the province will come together in Toronto for the 2011 Ontario Economic Summit (OES), which will kick-off with a keynote address by President Bill Clinton, Founder of the William J. Clinton Foundation and 42nd President of the United States.

The 8^th annual OES will be held November 21- 23, 2011 at the Fairmont Royal York Hotel in downtown Toronto and will feature some of the world’s leading minds from the business, government, labour, academia, not-for-profit and aboriginal communities, with a focus on three key topics:

• Innovation in Health Care Delivery
• Ontario’s Energy Future
• Championing Urban Regions

We will open the Summit with a Keynote Speech by President Bill Clinton on Monday night. Through his speech “Embracing our Common Humanity”, President Clinton will describe the challenge of globalization, emphasize our growing interdependence and point the way toward a common future based on shared goals and values. His address will be an inspirational start to the Summit and a timely discussion considering the Summit’s overall theme – Towards Ontario’s Next Great Era.

A ticket to the Keynote Speech by President Bill Clinton (with priority seating) is available with a full registration to OES.

For more information or to register please visit the OES website.

Today’s op-ed by Scott Stinson in the National Post reflects the growing frustration among Canadians and a variety of thought leaders and advocacy groups that little is being done by Ottawa or Queen’s Park to examine potential models of fundamental health care reform.

As Stinson aptly notes, health care gained some traction in the last federal election, but only to the extent that current levels of transfer payments to the provinces would be maintained at 6% for the foreseeable future.  A new report this week from the Canadian Medical Association (CMA) is another wake up call for government leaders (whom are well aware of the health care sustainability challenge) to step forward in a bold fashion and convene a variety of stakeholders to determine how best to sustain a system we are accustomed to and make it more efficient.

For Ontario, this higher level of efficiency and value for public dollars invested becomes increasingly important as our population increases by 28% by 2030.  Our senior population is projected to represent one in five of all Ontarians by this time.  With 42 cents of every program dollar already going towards health care, what level of “distress” is the right time to roll up our sleeves and truly address this dilemma?

No doubt, health care reform is a highly sensitive topic and Canadians across the political spectrum are deeply passionate about it.  Nevertheless, there will come a point at which it is no longer simply easier to ignore the matter or delay the point of crisis with additional funding – at the expense of other public spending priorities.  Think transportation gridlock for instance?  Is it so difficult to put aside our ideologies and pause for a constructive conversation about the health care system?  A dialogue that is open to all ideas and one that is built on a spirit of cooperation?  Whether or not there is enough of a public appetite for health care reform to become a top campaign issue in the upcoming provincial election, November’s Ontario Economic Summit will tackle it head-on.  We look forward to facilitating a genuine debate and strategy session among a cross-section of economic leaders who will seek to uncover dynamic solutions to this very complex challenge.

Photo source: Flickr (nihilenz)