Stewart Muir

It’s common mythology that B.C.’s traditional natural resource economy has reached its end-game and is being replaced by a “new economy” based on technology and innovation. The iconic logger has been replaced in our imagination by a computer programmer, miners supplanted by lab techs. As is usually the case with such convenient scenarios, the truth is not that simple. In fact, B.C.’s ‘old’ sectors like forestry and mining are driving technological innovations that are being put to work here and exported around the globe. Resource-based expertise from this province is pouring into the global knowledge economy, creating employment and opportunities for people from Vancouver’s Howe Street to downtown Fort St. John. This is being driven by smaller companies at the cutting edge of value-added fields like filtration, satellites, GPS, and digital analysis and simulation.