The SPI-Generate Canada partnership

July 3, 2024

Congratulations to our partner, The Natural Step Canada, on its rebranding to Generate Canada! Generate Canada launches and hosts Solution Spaces to address our most complex problems at the heart of the economy, environment, and society. Each Solution Space — four of which were spun out of an SPI and Generate Canada collaboration and research — is dedicated to a particular issue such as creating a circular economy for plastic or advancing a net-zero agri-food system in Canada. They gather people across sectors, governments, value chains, and communities to generate, test, and scale pragmatic solutions.

This launch also marks the official announcement of SPI’s strategic partnership with Generate Canada. Our organizations collaborate to advance a shared vision of a strong and inclusive Canadian economy that thrives within nature’s limits.

Smart Prosperity is excited by the evolution of a deeper partnership with Generate Canada’s Solution Spaces, one in which Generate Canada’s work is informed and advanced by SPI research and policy expertise in new ways. The partnership helps SPI further our mission to deliver world-class research and advance practical policy recommendations and market solutions for a stronger, cleaner economy. By tapping into the collaborations that Generate Canada’s Solution Spaces enable, we deepen our research and expand our stakeholder networks. The Smart Prosperity and Generate Canada partnership advances progress in a way that neither organization could achieve alone.

How our partnership all started

Six years ago, SPI first collaborated with Generate Canada on a project to examine how circularity could enhance material and energy efficiency. This activity was based on SPI’s recently launched Smart Prosperity Leaders Initiative. This work encouraged our two organizations to embrace the circular economy model as a key way to improve material and energy efficiency in Canada radically. Business partners quickly came on board, realizing that with academic research, practical policies, and the right collaborations, circularity could enhance their businesses’ sustainability and competitiveness. Circular Economy Leadership Canada (CELC) and the Canada Plastics Pact (CPP) were born from this work.

The initiatives, now called Solution Spaces, proved that SPI and Generate Canada had valuable qualities that, when combined, helped our organizations move the needle toward realizing our respective missions.

What we’ve achieved so far

SPI and Generate Canada’s partnership has continued to drive positive change in several key areas. Since the creation of CELC and the CPP, the partnership has successfully launched two more Solution Spaces: CANZA (Canadian Alliance for Net-zero Agri-food), and the Nature Investment Hub, and undertaken a joint project with the Energy Futures Lab. We are proud to work with team members across these Spaces.

Extending our mandate to train the environmental policy leaders of tomorrow, we have successfully engaged graduate students in the Solution Spaces. Several SPI students have since been hired as Generate Canada staff upon graduation.

As reinforcement that we were doing something new and impactful, SPI and Generate Canada received a Clean50 Award in 2023 for our partnership model.

Where we’re taking our partnership

As we expand and grow our program lines, being closely partnered with Generate Canada and working with the Solution Spaces allows us to connect with government, industry, Indigenous communities, and civil society in new ways, and amplify our research. We invite you to follow SPI on LinkedIn, X, and Facebook, and Generate Canada on LinkedIn and X. Subscribe to SPI’s newsletter for updates on new policy research, activities, and impacts.