The 2022-2025 Quebec Life Sciences Strategy was presented on Thursday by the Minister of Economy and Innovation, Pierre Fitzgibbon, during the Effervescence event, which brought together industry players. Quebec is allocating $211 million in budget appropriations which should generate investments of nearly $2 billion.
Posted at 7:03 p.m.
After being sidelined for years, the strategic nature of life sciences for the Quebec economy has been confirmed with the pandemic. As planned in its March budget, the government renewed the Quebec life sciences strategy, launched in 2017.
“In certain strategic niches such as life sciences, we don’t want to depend on an aircraft that won’t arrive from China one day,” said Mr. Fitzgibbon during a meeting with the media.
This five-pronged strategy will be essential for the implementation of the Health Plan announced in March by the Minister of Health and Social Services, Christian Dubé.
“Mr. Dubé in health has important issues to resolve. Innovation will be a stakeholder [afin] solve the problems,” Mr. Fitzgibbon explained. We are talking, for example, about technology for emergency triage, the well-known company Dialogue, which we now use. We, here at the Economy, our role is to find innovations that will make the Ministry of Health and Social Services say: I need it to solve my problems. »
The 211 million budget appropriations
The government is allocating $211 million in budgetary appropriations to the life sciences sector, which will be included in government spending, maintains the Minister of the Economy.
“When we look at the leverage effect, the 211 million in the five axes will represent 570 million in financial interventions from the government, and this amount, given that we are not financing 100%, will perhaps be 2 billion. »
Among the five areas of intervention in question, Québec wishes to develop human capital, attract talent, support the creation and growth of innovative businesses, attract and materialize investment projects and stimulate the commercialization of innovations.
To develop its plan, the Department consulted stakeholders in the ecosystem, whether multinationals, SMEs, start-ups, higher education institutions, health and social services institutions, organizations or other ministries. Over twenty briefs were received.
Difficult access to public tenders
Some Quebec innovations fail to integrate the Quebec health system during public calls for tenders. Asked about this, the Minister of the Economy said he was trying to find a balance, “a buffer zone where the qualitative criteria could ensure that a product which is not necessarily cheaper” would have an advantage, for example, for maintenance or customer service.
“But because of cost constraints, because of the objectives at the time of reducing deficits, the reflex was to say: if it’s cheaper and it’s a credible company, we take that, we won’t be wrong. not. There, we have gone elsewhere, and Mme Labelle, his responsibility is to say: we mustn’t go to extremes either, we mustn’t buy Quebecois only and pay 30% more because at the end of the day, we’ll end up in the same situation as 15 years ago. »
The Life Sciences Strategy launched in 2017 planned to attract $4 million in private sector investment in Quebec by 2022. The Minister confirmed that this amount has been reached.
The life sciences sector includes nearly 715 companies, which employ 36,930 people in Quebec.