Prime Minister Mark Carney officially unveiled Canada’s long-awaited AI strategy on Thursday, a document that encourages adoption across the country but has left some concerned that push could result in Canadians losing their jobs.
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The details were first reported by CBC News earlier this week after it obtained a draft version of the document. The official strategy contains most of the information earlier reported, with minor changes.
According to the official strategy, Canada aims to do the following, among other goals:
- Protect Canadians and children against the risks from AI and online harms.
- Provide Canadians access to free AI literacy training, including reaching one million entry-level post-secondary students.
- Create up to 90,000 AI-related job opportunities for young Canadians.
- Support creating up to 250,000 new jobs through AI adoption by 2031.
- Boost Canada’s business adoption of AI from 12 per cent today to 60 per cent by 2034.
- Build a world-leading supercomputer as part of significantly enhanced sovereign infrastructure by 2031.
- Build a multilateral alliance giving Canada sovereign autonomy in key AI capabilities.
The strategy promises at least $2 billion in new investment to achieve its aims.
It was met with joy by some Canadian AI leaders, including Valérie Pisano, CEO of Montreal AI institute Mila. She said the strategy is « ambitious » and « puts a stake in the ground » that Canada is building AI for all Canadians.
Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon said the government’s strategy ‘obviously is a pro-worker plan.’ (Justin Tang/The Canadian Press)
« To us, it’s a balanced, robust, complete strategy, and certainly it gives us momentum to keep going on the things that we care about, » Pisano said.
Opposition parties pounced on the employment angle. Conservative deputy leader Melissa Lantsman panned the strategy and said her party doubts the Liberals can create jobs for young people when youth unemployment is already high.
NDP MP Don Davies told reporters that he doesn’t believe mass adoption of AI will create jobs.
« I think it’ll cost jobs. And until there’s measures that are in place that will address that, I don’t think the strategy is complete, » Davies said.
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In a technical briefing for reporters before the announcement, senior government officials were asked whether Ottawa has an estimate on how many jobs could be lost to AI. They did not provide one.
During an interview with CBC’s The House airing Saturday morning, AI Minister Evan Solomon pointed to the Bank of Canada, whose deputy governor Michelle Alexopoulos recently told an Ottawa business audience there’s no evidence yet of widespread job losses.
« That doesn’t mean this won’t happen, » Solomon told host Catherine Cullen. « So our plan obviously is a pro-worker plan. »
The strategy aims to get people learning about AI through a National Literacy Initiative, which will offer entry-level training meant to be accessible to all Canadians. Ottawa also plans to train more than 3,000 educators with AI learning kits.
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There are also initiatives to help young people find employment as AI disrupts the job market through programs like the Student Work Placement Program and Canada Summer Jobs.
Ottawa will additionally « assess training and upskill offerings for mid-career workers, including in skilled trades, to scale up employer-led training nationwide with a strong priority on AI-related skills, » according to the strategy.
Those measures aren’t enough for some Canadian labour groups, but others welcomed the strategy and expressed a desire to work with the federal government.
In a statement sent to CBC News, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) argued the federal government is « putting the profits of Big Tech billionaires ahead of workers and the public by soft-pedalling protections against the risks of AI. »
A statement from Bea Bruske, president of the Canadian Labour Congress, said « Canada’s unions are united in calling for stronger AI laws, independent oversight, protections against surveillance and discrimination and a greater role for unions in shaping how AI is used. »
Light on AI safety
Carney acknowledged that Canada has to « be honest about the risks AI poses to Canadians, » including deepfakes, AI-generated disinformation and privacy concerns.
He also noted Canada « ranks near the bottom of countries in AI training, literacy and trust. »
The strategy highlights key actions Canada will take to address the issue, including modernizing consumer privacy legislation, introducing online safety laws, working on watermarking AI-generated content as well as a broader commitment to protecting elections and reviewing the Privacy Act.
However, like the draft version of the strategy, there are no details on specific actions.
The strategy does highlight that Canada will invest $50 million to expand the capabilities of the Canadian AI Safety Institute to track risks, advance technical research and transparently evaluate AI models.
Plus, Canada will « create a Canada trusted AI certification program to help Canadians identify trustworthy AI products in the marketplace. »
Scaling up AI adoption, Canadian champions
Key points in the strategy to boost AI use by small- and medium-sized businesses include utilizing the Business Development Bank of Canada’s LIFT program to help those businesses access financing to bring the technology into their operations.
Plus, Ottawa will invest $500 million to expand and enhance its Regional Artificial Intelligence Initiative, meant to help AI startups and growing firms scale up and address common challenges with AI adoption across critical sectors.
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It’s also going to add $700 million to the AI Compute Access Fund, bringing its total budget to $1 billion.
The fund covers two-thirds of eligible costs for Canadian cloud-based AI compute services, or half of eligible costs for non-Canadian equivalents.
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Canada will also launch a new AI Missions Program for projects « that deliver significant public good and demonstrate meaningful improvements in Canadians’ lives. » The first mission will commit $200 million to improve Canadians’ health outcomes.
As for scaling up top Canadian companies, the federal government is establishing a $500-million Canadian Tech Growth Fund, which would provide flexible capital and investment support and allow Ottawa to take equity stakes in « the most promising Canadian AI firms. »
« This will help them attract private capital, compete globally, retain talent and intellectual property and remain anchored in Canada, » the strategy said.
And Canada will leverage its recently announced sovereign wealth fund « where appropriate » to further support Canadian champions, the strategy adds. The details of how the fund will work have still not been released.
Canadian AI sovereignty
Carney highlighted Canada’s need for a sovereign AI ecosystem, but brushed off questions over whether doing so could irritate already-intense trade relations with the United States.
« This is a strategy any sentient country is taking, » Carney told reporters. « This is fundamentally strategic. »
Senior government officials said Canada doesn’t see itself moving completely away from a relationship with the United States on AI, but is trying to allow itself to scale in areas where it has a competitive advantage.
Ottawa plans to build a world-leading public supercomputer, according to the strategy, meant to give Canadian researchers and businesses access to computing power for « cutting-edge public and industry-driven innovation. »
Plus, Canada will work with private capital to build data centres that can scale to at least 100 megawatts.
On data, which the strategy said must be treated as a « strategic national asset, » Canada plans to invest $100 million to launch the Health Sector Data Space to link secure, private and standardized datasets to strengthen clinical trials.
The federal government is also looking to expand Vital, a collaborative health data platform, to five additional provinces. Ottawa plans to spend $100 million on that file.
Under the sovereignty pillar is also Canada’s plan to attract and retain talent. The document said the federal government will strengthen Canada’s network of national AI institutes and increase the number of Canada CIFAR AI Chairs from 130 to nearly 200 researchers.
Ottawa also plans to expand its Global Talent Stream permit program to accelerate the entry of highly skilled AI workers and « align measures for permanent residency to retain the talent Canada recruits. »
Source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/carney-ai-strategy-9.7223236
