10 ways for Canada to seize the moment

If there was a single theme uniting the discussion at PPF’s Canada Growth Summit 2026, it was urgency. As business and political leaders work to bolster national sovereignty, transform the economy and diversify Canada’s international relationships, the need to transform ideas into action was palpable. 

“It is an understatement to say that we are living in turbulent times,” noted Inez Jabalpurwala, the PPF’s President and CEO, at the outset of the day. “Good public policy has taken on even greater importance for institutions, our society, and our democracy, and it’s crucial that we get it right.”

As the day progressed, more than 40 of the country’s most accomplished leaders and ambitious thinkers shared ideas for how Canada can seize this consequential moment to propel the country into a new era of prosperity. Here are 10 that are sticking with us.

1. Get more ambitious

François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Finance and National Revenue, believes that Canadians need to get a lot bolder in playing the cards we hold. “I think the world has realized what Canada has to offer,” he told delegates during a fireside chat with PPF Board Chair André Beaulieu. “We need to raise our level of collective ambition.”

In an increasingly unstable world, Canada offers predictability and stability that all manner of international partners want, and leaning into that advantage can unlock significant economic gains. “We need to seize the moment, be ambitious, and build Canada strong together.” 

Later in the day, a panel devoted to attracting global capital for major projects got granular about what that might look like in practice. “We have to create the actual projects that are investment-worthy,” said Susannah Pierce, former president and country chair of Shell Canada, who helped lead the development of LNG Canada. 

Ehren Cory, CEO of the Canadian Infrastructure Bank, built on the sentiment: “If we provide process certainty, stakeholder certainty, and risk-sharing, the capital will flow.”

2. Leverage Canada’s energy security premium

“In the next few years, I believe the global energy map will be redrawn,” predicted Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, during a conversation with Gitane De Silva, Founder and Principal of GDStrategic, citing the effects of geopolitical unpredictability on shifting supply chains. “I wish there were a few more Canadas in the world so we had a much more reliable and sustainable energy system.” 

These evolving dynamics can work in Canada’s favour, Fatih continued. “There will be an energy security risk premium,” Birol said, as international buyers who might recently balked at paying five or 10 percent more for Canadian energy start to consider it a fair trade-off for stable supply. This is creating what he described as “a very important window of opportunity” for Canada in the next three to four years. “There is a lot of economic benefit here, and the cost of missing this train will be incredible,” he said. “Everybody in the sector needs to understand that this opportunity for Canada will not come back later. It is once in a lifetime.” 

3. Coordinate with other ‘middle powers’

Mélanie Joly, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for Canada Economic Development for Quebec Region, offered a window into a new type of multilateral conversations taking place with her international peers — specifically, those in Europe. 

The global response to the Trump administration’s tariffs, and the resulting recalibration of international relations, necessitates proactive dialogues with like-minded allies to avoid shutting one another out, she explained. “Part of my job as industry minister is to actually reach out to each other and ensure that, as protectionist policies are put in place in the EU, we’re not collateral damage,” she said in an interview with Graham Flack, former Secretary of the Treasury Board.

In Joly’s view, this approach is a practical manifestation of the ideas put forward by Prime Minister Mark Carney at the World Economic Forum in Davos in January. “It’s the middle powers [working] together,” she said. “That not only happens with trade deals, but also alignment of policies.”

4. Ignore the Eeyores

Even with Canada’s considerable economic advantages, speakers were clear-eyed about the challenging road ahead, especially with an impending review of the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) looming. As Steve Verheul, Former Chief Trade Negotiator for Canada, pointed out: “We have to approach this with a sense of urgency, because we have to do all things all at once.”

Yet according to Robert Greenhill, Chair of the Global Canada Initiative, there is little to be gained in adopting a defeatist attitude towards upcoming negotiations, and little to lose in going in with some swagger. “Canada is extremely (well) positioned. We do have what the world needs,” he said. “We need to ignore the Eeyores, seize the opportunity, and build the pipeline” of deals that can set up future prosperity.

5. Rally around the Arctic opportunity

During the Indigenous Ownership and Inclusive Growth breakfast, all eyes turned north to discuss the current alignment among government, industry, and Indigenous stakeholders in advancing economic growth in Canada’s arctic. “There’s a level of communication happening in the last year that we haven’t seen in 20 years,” reported Sean Boyd, Agnico Eagle’s Chair of the Board. “It is an exciting time,” added Northwest Territories Premier R.J. Simpson. “We are taking this very seriously. We are open to industry, we’re willing to cooperate, and we want to ensure that we’re taking advantage of this.”

Long-term success will require proof of commitment from all involved, especially government, in the view of The Honourable Erin O’Toole, Former Leader of the Conservative Party of Canada and Member of Parliament. “‘We the North’ needs to be more than the Raptors playoff slogan,” he said. “It needs to be something we all commit to. Let’s translate the moment into a long-term plan, one that provides fairness for northerners, reconciliation, and predictability for the private sector.”

Success will also require patience, according to Anne-Raphaëlle Audouin, Chief Executive Officer of Nukik Corporation: “A short-term lens just doesn’t work in the north.” But in her view, there’s now a chance now to create economic prosperity in the North that benefits all. “When you invest in Nunavut, it’s not just an investment for 40,000 people in Nunavut,” she said. “It’s an investment for 40 million Canadians.”

6. Formalize a new architecture of collaboration

Across the country, provincial governments are changing how they operate, embracing structures and operating models that encourage more effective and speedy collaboration. “No one department runs with a file anymore,” reported Joel Dickinson, Clerk of the Executive Council of New Brunswick. “We now take a whole-of-government approach.” 

This mindset is also extending to interprovincial relations. “We’ve very significantly rethought how governments work together,” said Michelle DiEmanuele, Secretary of the Cabinet of Ontario. There has been a “sea shift” in how Premiers work together, she explained: “They are talking to each other all the time, not just when there’s a crisis.” Currently, these dialogues are largely ad-hoc, DiEmanuele sees opportunity in formalizing them into a new architecture that encourages “an integrated approach” to finding solutions to the challenges within and outside of the federation. “We cannot play to not lose,” she said. “We have to play to win.”  

7. Emphasize the impact of AI

With the federal government’s long-awaited AI Strategy coming “very soon,” the Honourable Evan Solomon, Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation, delivered a keynote on how Canada can harness its AI capabilities in the current moment. 

Canadian conversations surrounding AI tend to be polarized, he said, with advocates (“Team Pom-Pom”) hailing its transformative power and skeptics (“Team Pitchfork”) warning of its risks. The charged tenor of these conversations tends to overshadow the issue that actually matters most in Canada’s approach to the technology: “We have a massive trust problem on AI that we have to deal with.”

In his view, Canadians need to talk more about how AI can improve daily lives, he said, pointing to examples of doctors saving an hour a day in administrative time by using AI scribes, and wildfire teams using the technology to better predict and orchestrate their response to natural disasters.  “These are real projects,” he said, and citizens need to know about them in order to believe the technology, and the policies that support it, work. “Technology moves at the speed of innovation, citizens move at the speed of trust.”

8. Treat health data as an essential national resource

Amid a global bio revolution in life sciences, “health data is an engine of economic growth,” said Fahad Razak, Canada Research Chair in Data-Informed Health Care Improvement. And in this context, Canada is ideally positioned to lead the world:

“The combination of diversity, data, and scientists who know how to use it creates, arguably, the single best jurisdiction globally” for the next wave of health innovation.

Canada has a long history of exceptional scientific advancement in life sciences, but a bad record in profiting from it: “We discover things that change peoples’ lives, and we have difficulty making sure Canada benefits first,” noted Dr. Paul Hébert, CEO of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. 

The first step in halting that cycle is to recognize Canada’s data-driven life sciences sector as the valuable asset it is, in the view of Rob Annan, President & CEO of Genome Canada. “This is an economic opportunity, that then creates a virtuous circle that improves the health of Canadians,” he said. 

9. Equip SMEs to advance productivity

Much of the discourse about Canadian economic productivity focuses on big business, but experts stressed the importance of equipping small- to mid-sized enterprises (which make up more than 99 percent of the businesses of Canada, generate half of the country’s GDP, and provide nearly two-thirds of private-sector jobs) to improve innovation and efficiency.  “Look at the capacity we have, to unleash and unlock,” Candace Laing, President & CEO, Canadian Chamber of Commerce. “This is a huge part of Canada’s path forward and one of our best next moves in making sure we can lock in our economic security.”

AI can be a “true productivity multiplier” for SMEs, according to Puja Subrun, Vice-President Canada and LATAM, Intuit, yet only about 10 percent of SMEs are using the technology deeply. Changing this requires aggressive work, added Mitacs CEO Stephen Lucas, including improving literacy across the board (including among business leaders) and connecting more smaller organizations with AI-fluent talent from colleges and universities. “We do have an opportunity to bend the curve, but it is urgent,” he said. 

10. Consider brain capital a policy imperative

A morning conversation shed light on another emerging skills issue in the AI conversation: One surrounding the human brain. “We’re about thinking, judgment, creativity, problem-solving, resilience and empathy,” noted Jabalpurwala. “These used to be called soft-ish skills, but now, in this new era of AI, they’re becoming really central to our ability to thrive as a society.”

If large parts of the population starts outsourcing its thinking to AI, the result will be “cognitive catastrophe,” explained Andrew Nevin, Research Professor and Inaugural Director of the Brainomics Venture at the Center for BrainHealth at the University of Texas at Dallas. Nevin went on to tout the value of embedding “brain capitalism” into policies related to skills development, productivity and citizen wellbeing. “If you focus on brain health, you will get an extraordinary payback: In human terms, but also in economic performance,” he said.

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