2008
Jim Rondeau on STEM
First, I'd like to say thank you to the staff. It's been a really busy year in Science, Technology, Energy and Mines. On page 2 and 3 is the list of the goals, objectives and some of the projects that we've worked on this year. I was very, very impressed at some of the projects and some of the initiatives. Now, I'm going to highlight a couple of them to move forward and let you know, Mr. Chair, and the committee, what's going on.
As far as science, we have a very good science sector in Manitoba. I'm pleased, because although we have about 3.7 percent or 4 percent of the population, we have about 8 percent of the national biotech activity which is good. These are jobs that are good jobs. They have good annual revenues and they're increasing and that's very, very positive.
As far as the energy sector, I'll highlight a few of the points that I'm very pleased with. One of the initiatives that has been very successful is the Centennial neighbourhood project. What that was was taking one of the poorest areas in the province, older housing stock, very inefficient housing stock. We work with the Winnipeg Foundation and a number of partners to bring energy efficiency there, to make conservation important, because often the poorest people in the province were paying some of the highest energy bills, and it was wrong. These are people who don't own the house, that are often renters, or they don't have money to do the retrofits.
So this was a really neat initiative where we worked with a number of groups, including Hydro, foundations, et cetera, and we really did a good job. There were large savings in each household. They're talking between $400 and $600 per household in savings in just utility costs from that initiative, and we've done about 150 houses. It was a wonderful program.
Also, the other part of that program was training a number of residents in the community to do carpentry and renovation and insulation skills. That was really good.
I'm particularly pleased that we've moved from ninth, as far as energy efficiency standards in Canada, to first, and we've retained that standing with the Energy Efficiency Alliance. Part of it is through Power Smart and part of it is through increasing the geothermal and other things that save energy.
Although we have about 3.7 percent of the population, we have about 30 percent of the geothermal installations. We actually have standards for the installers. We have a good association. We're moving forward very quickly on that. We actually have two manufacturers of geothermal heat pumps right here in Manitoba. One of the things I like to tell people is it's really nice to see that we're exporting manufactured goods to China. Most people can't say that. We actually are. We're also exporting that expertise around the world to the Middle East, et cetera.
Some of the other things I'd like to highlight is that 2007 was a record-breaking year for metal prices. It's been very good for the mining sector, the mineral sector. We've hit record numbers as far as oil production on oil activity. The mineral production is expected to exceed $3 billion and that's very, very impressive.
The other thing I'm very pleased with is that throughout most of Manitoba's history, exploration has been below $20 million a year. I'm pleased to say that companies spending intentions for exploration are about $116 million to $117 million this year. So it's a six-fold increase from basic historical, and that's really good.
I'd like to also just quickly mention R&D. We've been focussing a lot on research and development. We've gone from about $16.6 million in '99 to about $28.1 million this year. We've also increased the R&D tax credit, and so that's moving.
To conclude, one of my favourite comments is that we're moving forward in new-media gaming. I think the numbers in the last three years were up 1,850 percent in new-media gaming companies. I think it's great because, first, it's exciting, and, second, it has huge value-added. I just go through the story of three young men in B.C. that invented an Internet big-gaming company. They invented it in their backyard, in their basement, basically. They developed it, set it up and sold it this year for $310 million. All of these people were under 30 years old. So this is the type of industry you can compete anywhere on. It has huge value-added. It has great potential to export to the world. When you take it, the comparison between film, which is about a $20-billion-a-year industry, they're estimating new media will be between $40 billion to $60 billion a year in the near future. So it has huge up-side potential.
So, with the Red River training course, with the Fortune Cat as an incubator and with a lot of efforts, we've moved forward. I have to tell you, I am very, very pleased with 1,850 percent growth. We hope to continue some more growth, but I don't think quite at that rate.
So, with that, Mr. Chair, I'm pleased to see that the staff has joined me. Once again, I'd like to thank them for their hard efforts on behalf of all the people in Manitoba. They do a great job. I just look at all the initiatives that we've got. We've got two pages of initiatives. It's a very, very dynamic group of people, people that are committed to serving Manitoba, growing the industry, and it's truly a pleasure to continue working with them. Thank you very much.
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