Canadian taxpayers absorbed $12.7 million in losses last year after the National Research Council wrote down subsidies to now-insolvent firms, records tabled in the Commons show. Blacklock's Reporter says the failed grants spanned businesses from an Alberta shrimp hatchery to a microbrewery in Prince Edward Island.The funds were awarded under the Industrial Research Assistance Program, intended to “support research, development, adoption or innovation,” but were distributed without parliamentary oversight. Last year’s largest losses included $776,190 for Montréal AI developer Nuvoola Inc., $418,190 for Vancouver vending machine operator Upmeals Food Innovations Ltd., and $234,210 for Toronto biotech lab Sigma Analytical Services Inc. Other write-downs ranged from $165,000 for Montréal startup Hookmotion Inc. to $45,695 for Charlottetown’s Upstreet Craft Brewing.Conservative MP Dane Lloyd requested the figures, asking for the total value of grants and contributions provided since Jan. 1, 2022, to companies that have since ceased operations..Most of the subsidies involved payments made during the pandemic, when the NRC rolled out emergency wage support for research and development firms. Staff warned the high volume of applications strained work-life balance and mental health, as many grants were authorized on overtime.“Unexpected work was created,” a 2023 evaluation of the program noted. “Delivery of the program did generate an unprecedented volume of work that challenged staff work-life balance and well-being particularly in the absence of additional surge capacity.”The evaluation also highlighted the broader challenges faced by small and medium-sized enterprises during the pandemic, including abandoned R&D projects, staff cutbacks, cancelled contracts, investor risk aversion, and supply chain disruptions.Taxpayer-backed failures included small firms like Calgary’s Grand Rocky Shrimp Farm Inc., Upper Canada Growers Ltd. in Harrow, Ont., and other early-stage ventures that were unable to survive the pandemic’s economic turbulence.
