“We’re a pluralistic society that works, and we are a stable, reliable partner in a world that’s anything but.”
Carney has been working with allies to strengthen its AI industry, attract top talent and export its technology.
The strategy identifies a group of like-minded allies with which Canada is pursuing greater AI independence, including Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Finland, Norway and the European Union. It also highlights partnerships with Indo-Pacific countries such as Japan, Australia and India, as well as the United Arab Emirates.
The framework suggests Canada wants to become a global leader in AI by helping businesses and people to use AI widely and safely.
For starters, Canadians need to trust AI. Globally, Canada ranks near the bottom of countries in AI training, literacy and trust, Carney said.
Artificial Intelligence Minister Evan Solomon has spent the past year highlighting that public confidence in AI will determine its rise or fall. “Technology moves at the speed of innovation, but adoption moves at the speed of trust,” he often says.
The report emphasizes that Canadians deeply lack trust in AI. To address those concerns, the government plans to modernize federal privacy laws and introduce legislation aimed at protecting children online, while continuing efforts to combat AI-generated deepfakes and other online harms.
Trust has also been on the mind of Prime Minister Mark Carney. Last week, he spoke to Pope Leo XIV, who the prime minister considers a leader in the field of AI ethics. They discussed how the technology “must serve humanity, beginning with the protection of the individual,” a readout from the Prime Minister’s Office said.
Carney, a practicing Catholic, has also adopted language that echoes the Vatican’s emerging approach to artificial intelligence, emphasizing trust, human dignity and responsible innovation.
“The question is not whether AI will transform our lives. It will,” Carney said. “The question is whether it will improve the lives of all Canadians or benefit only a few.”
The prime minister also invoked the pope’s encyclical on AI in his own speech on Thursday. He repeated the pope’s warning that the scale and speed at which AI is advancing is proving to be the most powerful force humanity has ever had over itself.
“He set the challenge of whether we would use that power for the common good,” Carney said, emphasizing that AI must serve all Canadians — and its allies.
The strategy also calls for more Canadian-owned data centers, cloud infrastructure and semiconductor capacity to reduce the reliance on foreign companies. The Liberal government previously announced it would build a supercomputer by 2031.
Carney wants Canadian data to stay within its borders, governed exclusively by Canadian laws.
Carney’s AI strategy replaces the one introduced in 2017 by former Prime Minister Justin, which was considered groundbreaking at the time, but heavily favored AI research over commercialization.
Nearly a decade later, Canada has struggled to turn its AI knowledge into global success stories.
While Canada remains a world leader in AI research, producing talent that has helped build some of the industry’s biggest breakthroughs, many of those researchers have been recruited by U.S. tech giants, while Canada’s homegrown AI firms struggle to scale into global champions.
The strategy lays out a plan to help businesses, especially small- and medium-sized companies, get the resources and capabilities they need to take advantage of AI and compete internationally.
The Liberal government will concentrate its AI investments in five sectors: health and life sciences, energy and natural resources, transportation, agriculture, and manufacturing and robotics.
The strategy also includes measures to bring AI into classrooms, support business adoption of the technology and provide funding to help Canadian firms compete in global markets.
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