Facing a new wave of global uncertainty from the U.S., nearly 200 Waterloo Region leaders from business, education, and government convened to shape a proactive economic response. After a day of conversation on key priorities, the summit concluded with a unified pledge to turn this "wake-up call" into focused local action.
The last time a wave of global uncertainty washed into Waterloo Region, community leaders were ready.
That was five years ago, when a deadly new virus called COVID-19 prompted widespread lockdowns and threw the economy into disarray.
This time, the wave is coming at us from the Canada-U.S. border, in the form of stiff tariffs and annexation threats from the second Trump administration.
And, just like last time, we’re rising to meet the threat.
That much was clear on Wednesday, when nearly 200 attendees – from businesses spanning tech, manufacturing and professional services, as well as the education, non-profit and public sectors – convened at the Balsillie School for International Affairs in Waterloo.
“We’re going to get hit hard,” Richard Florizone, Special Advisor to University of Waterloo President Vivek Goel, told attendees during introductory remarks. “We have a responsibility, not just an opportunity, to lead on this on behalf of Canada.”
The day-long gathering, dubbed “Waterloo Region’s Community Economic Offence,” was Goel’s idea. It came together in just three weeks after Goel shared it with Florizone and Iain Klugman, CEO of NorthGuide, whose team helped shape and facilitate the agenda.
After a sobering briefing from experts in diplomacy and international affairs, including stark scenarios of what Trump 2.0 could mean for Canada, attendees broke into groups to come up with ideas on how our region might respond.
They heard a long list of challenges before heading into the breakout rooms, among them:
Summing up the first of two blocks of breakout sessions, NorthGuide’s Head of Ecosystem Strategy, Avvey Peters, told the crowd, “We have a lot of the elements we need; we just need to get on with it.”
In this case, “it” referred to things like building better physical and social infrastructure, increased co-operation among governments, and even a “ministry of sovereignty” to spearhead big national projects.
Andrea Kerswill, a Strategic Advisor with NorthGuide who led the project for NorthGuide, added that tax policy reform, support for startups and the lowering of regulatory hurdles were flagged as needs by participants.
At the day’s final plenary session after a second block of breakouts, attendees ranked the top six issues raised throughout the day that resonated with them. In descending order, they were infrastructure, talent, regulatory reform, tax policy, government collaboration, and intellectual property.
They then weighed in on a list of initiatives they’d most like to take part in – from boosting cross-sectoral collaboration, talent retention and telling a better regional story, to building a more tech-ready workforce and IP-related measures.
The event wrapped up with a pledge to reconvene local leaders in the coming weeks to plan next steps.
“We want to turn global uncertainty into local action,” Florizone said in his closing remarks.
Afterwards, in a brief interview, Florizone said he was encouraged by the turnout, which far exceeded expectations given the short notice.
“Not only did they come, but they stayed for the day and they shared their ideas in really earnest conversation,” he said.
The next step is to move from talking to doing.
The sudden hostility from the U.S. has “laid bare some of our weaknesses,” Florizone said, which have magnified the threats to our sovereignty and provided “a wake-up call for all of us.”
“I don’t think it requires a shift in our values, but it means we have to be more action-oriented,” he said.
“I think that’s the bottom line: The way Canadians approach problems, I don’t think we need a fundamental change to it. What we need, though, is more action.”