Magnetic North: The Canadian (Mining) Miracle – by Mark P. Mills (Forbes – June 12, 2011)

www.forbes.com

Mark P. Mills is a founding partner in energy-tech-focused Digital Power Capital, a private equity firm focused on new technologies that arise from the convergence of power and the tools, materials and software of the digital age.

In child psychology birth order is often considered significantly determinative.  Younger siblings often learn lessons watching the elder ones, well, screw up.  Canada is almost a full century younger than its North American sibling.  What exactly is going on above the 49th parallel?  First quarter 2011 my Canadian brethren and sisters (full disclosure, je suis Canadien) delivered a 3.9 percent GDP growth rate against an enervating 1.8 percent U.S. rate.  Just a few short years ago, nobody would have predicted this.

Nearly one-third of Canada’s GDP is export-based with nearly half of that coming from minerals, metals and fuels.  It is a nation extracting value from its natural environment, not ‘plundering’, as Canadians’ respect for their land is deep and abiding.  And America benefits, receiving three-fourths of Canada’s exports.

Of particular interest these days is the re-invigorated gold rush in that vast northern expanse.  No surprise.  Gold is expensive again, bouncing around $1,500 an ounce.

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The best investment in the world [Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Region] – by Matthew Mendelsohn and John Austin (National Post – June 13, 2011)

The National Post is Canada’s second largest national paper.

Matthew Mendelsohn is the director of the Mowat Centre at the University of Toronto. John Austin is the nonresident senior fellow, Metropolitan Policy Program at Washington, D.C.’s Brookings Institution. To learn more, visit www.greatlakessummit.org.

Regions are becoming more important because capital and talent tend to cluster
geographically so that employers have easy access to potential partners and
employees. Clusters emerge in regions that possess natural, cultural and place-
defining attributes that make them attractive places to live and work. They also
emerge near centres of public and private research and education.
(Matthew Mendelsohn and John Austin)

In the first in a five-part series ahead of the Mowat Centre and Brookings Institution Summit on the Future of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence region, starting next week in Windsor and Detroit, two experts argue that with proper governance, the Great Lakes region could be the success story of the century ahead.

Regions will be just as important as nation-states in ensuring the wellbeing of communities in the coming decades. The Great Lakes-St. Lawrence region – made up of the eight states and two provinces (Quebec and Ontario) that surround these great waters – has everything necessary to succeed in this new world.

Regions are becoming more important because capital and talent tend to cluster geographically so that employers have easy access to potential partners and employees. Clusters emerge in regions that possess natural, cultural and place-defining attributes that make them attractive places to live and work. They also emerge near centres of public and private research and education.

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