Buying with Intent

Ultimately, the use of public procurement to stimulate innovation requires openness to new ideas, the identification and communication of challenges that are currently not being met by existing market solutions, and the political will to include innovation as an explicit objective of the procurement process and to provide adequate financial support for it. [...] Adherents should develop strategies and action plans to integrate the secondary objectives into the procurement system and to monitor the effectiveness of the procurement system in achieving them. [...] Canada had the largest share of total public expenditure at subnational level in OECD (76.2 per cent compared to the OECD average of 40.4 per cent) and the second largest share of subnational expenditure in GDP in 21 Two of the eligibility conditions for the ISC program is that businesses must have no more than 499 employees and 50 per cent of wages, salaries and fees should be paid to employees o [...] The plan includes advancing the reduction in the corporate income tax rate to eight per cent to Jul 1, 2020 and the introduction of the Innovation Employment Grant for companies that invest in research and development to incentivize job creation in high growth new industries. [...] VI. RECOMMENDATIONS FOR INCREASING THE USE OF PUBLIC PROCUREMENT TO STIMULATE INNOVATION AT THE PROVINCIAL AND MUNICIPAL LEVELS The procurement of innovative goods and services by the public sector may be an answer to Canada’s innovation problem but, as seen above, it comes with a significant set of challenges.