BC's Response to the Canada’s AI Task Force

We Showed Up. Now What?

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*BC + AI Executive Director Kris Krug reflects on BC's participation in Canada's AI Task Force consultation and what federal recognition could mean for the community that showed up.*

Last year, 645 British Columbians participated in Canada's AI Task Force consultation. That's 20.6% of everyone who responded nationwide, second only to Ontario.

We showed up because we're already building something that works. And when the Task Force expert reports came out, I did what I always do. I read them. All 32 reports. Not the summary, the actual documents.

That's when things got interesting.

Buried in those expert reports, the ones most people will never read, are specific recommendations for Vancouver. Not vague references to "regional representation." Specific, actionable proposals naming Vancouver as a strategic location for Canada's AI infrastructure.

Three different Task Force experts independently recommended Vancouver for federal AI investment. And they weren't being polite about geography. They were being specific about capability.

Let me show you what they said.

What the Experts Actually Said About BC

Let me tell you about Arvind Gupta's report on Research and Talent. He's proposing a solution for application-oriented AI research that serves industry, government, and civil society. And right there in the text, he writes: "A hub-and-spoke approach may work best whereby a physical institute (say in Vancouver) builds links into the three existing institutes."

Say in Vancouver.

Not "maybe someday." Not "we should consider coastal representation." He literally named Vancouver as the location for a fourth AI institute to complement Toronto, Montreal, and Edmonton.

Then there's Patrick Pichette, former Google CFO, guy who knows a thing or two about infrastructure, recommending in his Scaling report: "Focus quantum in Vancouver."

He's talking about regional specialization to create critical mass, and he sees Vancouver as Canada's quantum hub. Why? Because we have 98% renewable energy from BC Hydro, and quantum computing is massively energy-intensive.

The clean energy advantage isn't theoretical. It's operational.

And Garth Gibson, in the Infrastructure report, explicitly names Vancouver alongside Waterloo and Halifax as a "leading community" that needs federal AI engineering support. He's talking about expanding the reach of AI Institutes to where the talent already is.

BC + AI Ecosystem | Building a Responsible & Inclusive AI Future for British Columbia

These are concrete, expert-validated recommendations for how Canada can strengthen its AI strategy by including BC.