Canada’s economic challenges are often described in broad national terms.
However, researchers say those challenges are better understood as unique pieces of a large and complex jigsaw puzzle — and a Memorial University researcher is playing a key role in a $6-million, multi-year project to reveal how the pieces fit together.
Dr. Tony Fang, who also holds the Stephen Jarislowsky Chair in Cultural and Economic Transformation in the Department of Economics in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at Memorial, is a co-applicant of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Policy Innovation Partnership Grants competition.
Led by Dr. Trevor Tombe of the University of Calgary, the project brings together more than 30 researchers, six federal government departments and agencies, and six university partners, including Memorial.
The team’s goal is to generate evidence-based solutions to improve Canada’s productivity.
“In the early 2000s, our productivity was 83 per cent of the United States’ level. By 2024, that number had dropped to 73 per cent.”
The urgency of the project is underscored by recent statistics about Canada’s productivity performance, particularly how the country continues to lag behind peer economies.
“In the early 2000s, our productivity was 83 per cent of the United States’ level,” said Dr. Fang. “By 2024, that number had dropped to 73 per cent. That’s a significant decline.”
At its core, the 15-year project aims to support long-term collaborations between researchers and policymakers to better understand and address a problem that experts say will not yield to a one-size-fits-all approach.
Missing pieces
Dr. Fang notes that Atlantic Canada is distinct from the rest of the country when it comes to productivity.
Unlike larger markers, the Atlantic region is shaped by factors such as aging populations, smaller firms and industry structures that differ from the national average.
“We are definitely unique,” he said. “Atlantic Canada relies heavily on natural resource industries like fisheries, oil, gas, mining and so on. Because these sectors are capital-intensive, meaning that companies require large, upfront investments, they tend to employ fewer people.”
He adds that demographic pressures are particularly pronounced.
Newfoundland and Labrador, for example, has the oldest median age in the country, while Atlantic Canada as a whole faces lower fertility rates and ongoing labour shortages in key sectors.
Memorial’s role
As for their role, Dr. Fang and his team will contribute expertise on labour markets, career development, immigration, skills utilization and artificial intelligence.
They will also examine how Canada can better align workers’ skills with available opportunities and help employers make better use of talent.
Simply put, skill-matching is the process of aligning an individual’s unique skillset with the requirements of a job.
While it sounds simple enough, many job applicants in Canada struggle to find work that aligns with their capabilities or interests.
“We have highly skilled students, graduates and immigrants, but too many of them end up in jobs that don’t match their qualifications.”
According to Dr. Fang, artificial intelligence presents new opportunities to improve productivity, but also creates challenges in matching workers with the skills employers need.
As job requirements continue to change rapidly in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and technological shifts, our education and settlement systems may need to adapt.
These changes will be essential to better prepare students and newcomers for the future labour market and their career development, says Dr. Fang.
“In the COVID era, Canada had double-digit unemployment, but 40 per cent of firms said they couldn’t find workers. The issue was often skill-matching.”
He notes that Canada has an educated workforce, including newcomers to the country, but that qualifications are often not recognized or aligned with employment opportunities.
He also says this hurts Canada’s productivity performance and also doesn’t serve individuals who are trying to achieve their potential.
“We have highly skilled students, graduates and immigrants, but too many of them end up in jobs that don’t match their qualifications. A lot of recent immigrants, in particular, are stuck in low-wage jobs.”
Project scope
In addition to producing peer-reviewed research, the partnership aims to create open-access datasets, policy briefs, interactive tools and holds annual conferences designed to support evidence-informed decision-making.
Students and post-doctoral fellows will play a central role through mentorship opportunities, government internships and collaborative research activities.
For Dr. Fang, the scale and duration of the project offer a rare opportunity to generate meaningful long-term impact.
“A project of this scale is not common,” he said. “Six million over 15 years is one-of-a-kind.”
He hopes the team’s work will lead to significant social, economic and cultural impacts.
“I’m not sure if that’s too ambitious, but certainly, that’s our objective from the very beginning.”
