Analysis

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Federal Science and Technology Spending

Federal departments and agencies forecast spending of $9.9 billion in 2008/2009 on science and technology (S&T), a small decrease from the $10.2 billion in planned spending the year before and a slight increase, in current dollars, from the $9.6 billion spent in 2006/2007, where actual, or final, data are available (Table 1-1).

1. Data for 2008/2009 are forecasts of expenditure by departments and thus are provisional and subject to change. Data for 2007/2008 are planned spending for a fiscal period that has almost closed by the time data are collected; these data are provisional, but change only rarely. Data for 2006/2007 are actual expenditures incurred by the reporting departments and agencies, and, as such, are not subject to change.

Of the $9.9 billion, $5.2 billion was forecast to be spent within the departments and agencies (Table 2-1) and $4.7 billion directed to other sectors such as higher education, the business sector, private non-profit organizations and foreign and other entities, to support their S&T activities (Table 3-1).

Measured in constant dollars to account for impacts of inflation, actual federal government S&T spending increased by 44% over the ten-year period from 1997/1998 to 2006/2007 (Table 1-1).

Federal S&T expenditures are composed of two elements: research and development (R&D) and related scientific activities (RSA). Research and development is defined as “creative work, undertaken in a systematic manner … to increase the stock of knowledge”. ¹  Related scientific activities include activities such as scientific data collection, information services, special services and studies and education support, as well as administration of extramural RSA activities, all of which support R&D activities.

The majority, $6.2 billion or 63%, of federal S&T spending was forecast to be directed to R&D activities, while RSA accounts for the remainder, $3.6 billion (Table 1-5).

S&T expenditures are available for two science types, “natural science and engineering” and “social sciences and humanities”. About three-quarters of all federal government S&T spending has been directed to natural sciences and one quarter to social sciences throughout the period from 2004/2005 to 2008/2009 (Table 1-6).

In 2008/2009, the funding agencies (the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Social Sciences ($1.0 billion); the Canadian Institute for Health Research ($902 million); the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada ($649 million); and the Canadian Foundation for Innovation ($462 million)) were forecast to account for over 30% of all federal S&T expenditures (Table 1-2).

Of the 54 departments and agencies that report S&T expenditures, 16 each accounted for at least two percent of the total. Together these 16 departments and agencies accounted for over 85% of the total S&T expenditures (Table 1-2).

Intramural performance of S&T

In 2008/2009, the $5.2 billion in S&T activities to be performed by federal government departments and agencies was forecast to be split almost evenly between R&D and RSA; $2.5 billion, or 48%, was directed to R&D and remainder to RSA (Table 2-1).

With respect to forecast intramural R&D performance, the top departments and agencies are: the National Research Council ($590 million), Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada ($292 million) and National Defence ($243 million) (Table 2-3).

Top forecast RSA performing agencies and departments are: Statistics Canada ($569 million), Environment Canada ($362 million), Health Canada ($290 million) and Natural Resources Canada ($286 million) (Table 2-4).

Extramural funding of S&T

The federal government funds S&T activities through grants, contributions and contracts. Grants or contributions are not intended to secure a particular deliverable, but rather to promote the undertaking of the activity being supported. Contracts, by contrast, are connected to a particular deliverable sought by a department. The distribution of this funding through these channels has been stable from year to year.

In 2008/2009, the federal government was forecast to direct $4.7 billion to other sectors to perform S&T activities. Four in five extramural dollars were forecast to be directed to R&D activities (Table 3-1).

Over $3 billion in extramural payments were forecast to be directed to the higher education sector. Ninety percent of these funds were for R&D activities and the remaining ten percent for RSA. The vast majority of the funds for R&D activities came from the four granting councils (Table 3-3).

The second most significant recipient of federal government S&T funding is the business sector, forecast to receive $1.0 billion in 2008/2009 (Table 3-2).

The business sector was forecast to receive funds as follows: 17% through R&D contracts, 43% through grants and contributions for R&D and the remaining 39% for RSA activities. (Table 3-4) Industry Canada continued to provide the largest share of funds for S&T directed to the business sector and it provided these funds in support of R&D activities exclusively (Table 3-2).

Personnel

In 2008/2009, federal departments and agencies reported a total of 36,379 full-time equivalent employees engaged in S&T activities. Of these employees, 16,824 were classified as “scientific and professional”, 8,740 as “technical” and 10,815 as “other” engaged in support activities (Table 4-5).

Over half (57%) were engaged in RSA and support of RSA, with the remainder engaged in R&D and its support. More S&T personnel were engaged in S&T related to natural sciences and engineering than social sciences and humanities (Table 4-1).

A majority of federal personnel S&T engaged in natural science activities were located outside of the National Capital Region. Spread across all regions of Canada, there were 2,108 full-time equivalent personnel at work in Atlantic Canada, 3,122 in Quebec and 3,689 in Ontario (in areas outside the National Capital Region), 2,901 in the Prairie provinces, 1,619 in British Columbia and 231 in the North. The National Capital Region (Ottawa, Gatineau and surrounding areas) reported 10,619 full-time equivalent personnel in natural sciences (Table 4-8).

By contrast, the vast majority of social science-oriented S&T personnel were located in the National Capital Region (10,104 out of a total of 11,739) (Table 4-8).

Objectives of S&T and R&D activities

Protection and improvement of human health was the objective receiving the highest level of federal government S&T funding at $1.7 billion in 2006/2007, the most recent year for which data are available (Table 6-1).

In terms of R&D funding, the three most significant objectives for federal funds were: protection and improvement of human health ($1.4 billion), industrial production and technology ($1.0 billion) and non-oriented research ($754 million) (Table 6-2).

Overall, 40% of all R&D was performed intramurally, but certain objectives were more likely to be researched within government departments than others. Energy-related R&D, along with R&D related to national defence, agriculture, fishing and telecommunication were at least 70% undertaken in-house, while health-related R&D was the most likely to be funded by the federal government but performed by other sectors.