BC Attracting Lots of Investment
Wednesday, August 22, 2012 @ 3:56 AM
Prince George, B.C.- When it comes to attracting investment, B.C. is outpacing the rest of the nation.
A new report shows investment activity in B.C. was up 71% in the second quarter this year compared to the same period in 2011. In fact, B.C. attracted more than 20% of all venture capital invested in Canada.
"This report speaks to the great confidence that investors currently have in British Columbia” says Minister of Jobs, Tourism and Innovation, Pat Bell.
Bell says the report also reflects positively on the B.C. Renaissance Capital Fund “It is something we have had a focus on for a period of time now, and we are very pleased with the results.” B.C. Renaissance Capital Fund Ltd. was created to find pursuing investment for four key technology sectors: digital media, information technology, life sciences and clean technology .
While most of the investment has been in companies located in the lower mainland, Bell says there are northern connections. NexTerra Energy Systems is developing clean air natural gas from wood base products. It is involved in the gasification plant at UNBC and is in partnership with Tolko in establishing a bio-mass gasification facilities near Vernon to kiln dry lumber.
But is there investment confidence when it comes to energy projects such as Enbridge’s proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline? Bell says he thinks investment will happen if companies feel they are being treated fairly. He says companies need to know there is “ a clear path to the road they wish to achieve” and that “Enbridge is a project that is going through the process and we have clearly articulated what it needs to do in order to be successful and in our view there are five specific parameters. Whenever a project has in front of it a specific and clearly articulated objective then I think people feel they are being treated fairly and that is the key to investment attraction, people feel they are being treated fairly.”
He says that holds true not only for the Enbridge proposal, but the recently announced “Kitimat Clean” oil refinery project put forth by David Black. “Mr. Black’s proposal is interesting. It will need to go through the environmental assessment process to be successful. I think he has clearly articulated there are a number of challenges that he needs to work through in terms of attracting capital. What I think is interesting about Mr. Black’s proposal is that it has opened up a different dialogue about the Enbridge pipeline.” He says at the minimum, Black’s proposal deserves a fair hearing.
Comments
Time to fudge the numbers to make the liberals look good.
You’re right P Val election coming up anything to try and get back in.
Wow,over ten years of Liberal rule and the investors are just now planning on coming to BC??? They must be seeing some positive changes coming in the near future?
When you are giving away our resources with no plan or overall structure for long term benefits to the province, there is no shortage of companies wanting to come in.
Everything sounds just peachy when getting reports from the Lib’s when it comes to things they have their hands into.
Yet the BCGEU are told how our economy is so bad there is nothng for them.
I guess that kind of BS will fool some people.
Good point Dragon.
I suppose that the investers know that the NDP will form the next government and they want part of th action that will happen after the election.
Cheers
In my humble opinion,the BCGEU will probably agree with government and be happy they don’t have to fight so hard for their membership, fold their cards and go home, then blame it on government.
I sure doesn’t take much to bring the pro NDP out of the woodwork. Maybe we should continue to give our natural resourses to the USA for whatever they want to pay, which is what is happening now. Then we can something to really cry about. Remember BC Hydro and the shafting we took from the US.
PG attracts lots of investment also: from the gangs.
You don’t often see the words ‘investors’ and ‘NDP’ in the same sentence. Nice work, retired.
When the NDP. Was last in power businesses couldn’t leave this province fast enough to get away from the NDP taint. The provincial liberal government brought those businesses back it took the liberals 6 long years to undo what the NDP did and now we are with Alberta the 2 strongest economies within Canada yet people don’t want to believe it because job numbers are low it’s tough to find work and so on.
The NDP. Is poised to regain power again next spring and if history says anything the last 3 times they have held power in BC our economy sank Adrian Dix is an idiot of the first order he will destroy everything the liberals did to get out of the mess Glenn Clark put us into.
“While most of the investment has been in companies located in the lower mainland”
I thought the LML was riding the coat tails of the hinterlands?
“You don’t often see the words ‘investors’ and ‘NDP’ in the same sentence”
But you constantly see the words “free taxdollar handouts” to business and govt corporate CEO’s and “BC Liberals” in the same sentence.
Thats why the anti NDP gang are doing all this fear mongering, their free rides are coming to an end.
Keep hughing the NDP glue people. You can’t damage an NDP brain by doing so.
Actually huffing glue affects ones ability to spell correctly also.
Well as far as I’m concerned, it’s too little too late!
12 freaking years to come ahead???
Imorge; you hit the nail right on!
Dearth, what exactly did Glen Clarke do in comparison to Gordon Campbell eh, Glen Clarke built a deck. There isn’t enough room on this 250 to begin with Gordon Campbell and his pantie gang. 6 families that I knew had to move to Alberta to get jobs, all the while this Liberal gang was letting all our jobs go abroad! What JOBS did the Liberals create here! Remember they’ve had the wheel for 12, Twelve years!
Incredible how people forget.
Glen Clark built a deck, huh? You might want to check out his wikipedia page for a list of scandals under his watch.
Why is it that when a Liberal story comes out everyone calls it lies, yet these same people believe the NDP stories of how great the province was doing under the NDP rein? If it was so great why were we getting Federal transfer payments as a “have not” province? Dearth nailed it. We weathered this recession better than most and Dix is on his way to create our very own little BC created recession. Awesome.
“What I think is interesting about Mr. Blackâs proposal is that it has opened up a different dialogue about the Enbridge pipeline” .. I don’t see how piping the bitumen to a refinery is any different than to a tanker. It still has to cross the same creeks, rivers, lakes and go through the same risky country. Only a desperate politician would think there is a difference that is “interesting”.
Personally, I have finally recovered from the financial setback the NDP caused me and my family 17 years ago.
I do not have enough steam left in me to go through that again.
And I am confident that I won’t have to. That doesn’t mean I have been thrilled with the crew in charge lately either. I am not.
Funny how Dearth calls Adrian Dix an idiot after the crap he just tried to sell us. Listen Dearth, I’m an avid Liberal lover too but dont start lying just because you don’t like NDP. Clark and his pub cra and deck building scam did not have anything to do with his good work he did for BC. Dix is anti Enbridge and I am thinking of supporting him just on that premise alone. I happen to love Christie Clark but have the scrotum to do some research and admit when we were doing the wrong thing. Now I am anti-pipeline. The NDP did good in BC and no companies left as a result of them. Be honest. Watch the news . Pay attention.
Still it is nice to see there are a few die-hard Liberal supporters left in the province. Busty Clark is a lot easier to look at than Adrian Dix. I am not alone.
Oh sorry got side-tracked by cute Christie. No one has ever done more damage to BC nor put us in worse condition economically than Gordo! He created the worst depression BC as ever seen. The George Bush of BC.
Here’s a nice article for those who forgot the 90’s, and by the looks of it, there are a lot of you.
“During the NDPâs reign of terror, B.C. ranked last in private sector job creation in all of Canada and suffered from the highest unemployment rate of all the Western provinces.
Real disposable income dropped every year between 1991 and 1997 and while bankruptcies across Canada fell by 13%, they rose by 12% in British Columbia.
And letâs not forget the eight consecutive deficits, which led to not one but two credit rating downgrades and the worst fiscal record in Canada.”
http://www.bclocalnews.com/opinion/148963415.html
Sure, the Liberals aren’t perfect by any stretch, but let’s not fool ourselves about the NDP.
Well you can back a winner or you can back a loser….how many Liberal MLAs are going to resign to spend more time with their families in the next few months?
Western2
I know what I am talking about I was there watching Clark screw up the province I was new to the forest industry at the time and I was surprised at how many supply and service companies refused to have anything to do with BC mostly because the NDP was very pro envirnmentalism and we ended up with a huge mess on our hands.
3 yrs after the Campbell government took over those same supply and service companies that shunned BC started to come back and the once ailing forest industry rebounded.
I was there I lived the NDP F***up and the Liberal turn around
Let me boil it down to the basics for you.
An NDP government will send investment dollars in this province running for the exits, screaming.
If you want to be a ‘Have-Not’ province, vote NDP.
It’s as simple as that.
What Rocky said x 10.
Damn page resets….
Interceptor… the ndp never had BC as a have not province (even during the Asian flu crisis that hit BC hard)… that have not status was brought to us after a number of years of BC liberal rule.
The ndp had balanced budget years and a big deficit of $400 million… the BC liberals brought us more debt than we accumulated in our entire history prior to them coming to power with multi billion dollar deficits.
From a corruption perspective the BC liberals are in a class of their own.
“Here’s a nice article for those who forgot the 90’s, and by the looks of it, there are a lot of you.”
“Andy Radia is a Coquitlam resident and political columnist who writes for Yahoo! Canada News and Vancouver View Magazine. He has been politically active in the Tri-Cities, having been involved with election campaigns at all three levels of government, including running for Coquitlam city council in 2005.”
Hmmm, I wonder which political party Radia ran for?
Kinda like takin the foxes word for it that it didn’t kill the chicken or the RCMP investigating the RCMP….
Facts are facts. Sorry you can’t deal with them.
http://www.policyalternatives.ca/newsroom/updates/bcs-super-fudge-it-budget
Fact, not Wikipedia.
Hey hammy, thanks for the link from the left wing think tank. Maybe I should post one from the Fraser Institute?
“the ndp never had BC as a have not province (even during the Asian flu crisis that hit BC hard)… that have not status was brought to us after a number of years of BC liberal rule.”
Very interesting non-factual statement ….. far too many people on here shoot off thei mouths based on prejudgements made without facts … in other words, prejudicial statements that moves down the opinion 250 church pews with accurate information coming in (well sometimes) and inaccurate staetments going out the other side of the pews.
The nature of thse blogs, isn’t it?
Here are the researched facts for those who give a chit .. (very few do, of course)….
1999/2000 equalization was $125 million
2000/2001 $0 (fiscal year ends prior to 2001 election in BC)
2001/2002 $195 (fiscal year starts when NDP still in power and I believe transfer payment calculated on past performance and budget presented before federal fiscal year.
The BCLiberals have had 4 transfer payment years, but none in 2002, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 … that would make it 7 years â¦.
One does not need to go to a right or left leaning think tank â¦. Learn to do your own research from an appropriate source â¦. In this case statscan â¦..
1994-2005 http://www.fin.gc.ca/budget04/bp/bpa6-eng.asp
2005 â 2013 http://www.fin.gc.ca/fedprov/mtp-eng.asp
Gus is right. You won’t find many facts on wikipedia or get many facts from think tanks.
Nice try though, johnnytroll.
Casinogate, the fast ferry scandal and the bingogate scandal under Harcourt were fictitious?
You do what ever you need to do John Belt
The biggest fast ferry scandal was when they got dumped for less than the value of the aluminum.
And what about the convention center, BC Place roof, and BC Rail… all of which make the fast ferries seems small in comparison.
PS I don’t like defending the ndp… but facts are facts.
Gus you are right about 1999… with the softwood battle in full gear at the time.
Facts are the BC liberals had far more have not equalization payments and had them in years when the global economy was in one of its biggest booms in recorded history.
Eagle
the 90’s were the biggest boom years in history and the dippers had BC in the ditch hard. The 2000’s had the biggest recision/collapse since the 30’s. How anybody can say the NDP were better economic stewards thean the Liberals must be completly stoned.
I’m not saying they were better.
I’m saying its not legitimate to claim the ndp made BC a have not province when they only had that distinction for one full year at a hundred million after the Asian Flu (biggest recession in modern history with our second largest trading region), and after the softwood lumber tariffs (our largest exporting industry and customer).
The early 2000’s seen the fastest growing global economy in history and three full years into the BC liberal mandate as a have province they then ran up what a string of five years as a have not province totaling over 15 times what the ndp received in transfer payments. Anyone with any sense of the markets would know full well the bankster recession didn’t start until mid 2008 long after the fact.
Facts are it is dirty politics to claim the ndp was the have not party, when the BC liberals were 15-times worse in better economic times.
IMO both parties severely mismanaged the BC economy for their own special interest politics. But it serves no one to lie about the record for partisan politics.
Once again neo-con politics creates a lie to smear their way into trickery with actual facts.
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