How to make Northern BC more resilient, diversified and sustainable

Posted on Feb 29, 2012 in Local Events, Technology

As the keynote speaker for the UNBC Graduate Student Conference, I am looking forward to sharing how we can make the economy in Northern BC more resilient, more diversified, as well as more sustainable with well paying employment opportunities.

You’re invited to join me for the conference on March 1 as the topic I am going to be speaking about affects everyone – not just engineers and people interested in the sciences.

Although I am not an economist, I know that economies are more stable when there is growth in our populations. If we have people leaving our communities here in the north, the economy is obviously not prosperous, which fortunately at this time is not the case. Even if we have zero or minimal growth in our populations, our economy is not stable and resilient.

Continuing to stimulate population growth will help make our community more resilient.

This is the major reason we need individuals who can innovate and create. Innovation is how new businesses are created. Most innovations and patents are registered by people who are technically trained. Their brains are wired to look at problems and see opportunities.

Now, when I said this affects everyone I was talking about the non-science or non-technical educational programs. Our arts, business and fine arts people, for example. These other programs are just as vital in growing our population as engineering since these are the professions that help manage and grow the innovation once it has been created.

Luckily the north already has masters programs for the arts and business and many other professions.

Everyone has their role in growing the community. In order to have something to grow, we need new technical and innovative ideas that often come from those with engineering and technical training… and in order to sustain these businesses we need the right people to manage and take them to the next level.

This in a nutshell is what I am going to be speaking about. If this has piqued your interest and you can see the bigger picture of how everyone has a role in helping to increase our population and stimulate growth in Northern BC, then I invite you to come to this event. My keynote will go into a lot more depth about this topic. I look forward to seeing you there.

Thursday, March 1, 2012 @ 10am in the Bentley Centre at UNBC.