The federal government says it is committing billions to supercharge the adoption of artificial intelligence across the country, support companies including AI startups and boost AI literacy, skills and trust in the technology.
Canada was the first country to release a national AI plan in 2017, but the new blueprint released Thursday, called AI for All, is a “pragmatic and prudent approach” designed to lift Canadian productivity and economic growth while safeguarding Canadians from AI-related risks, according to the government.
“The question is not whether AI will transform our lives. AI is already changing how we work, how we learn and how we connect,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said in a speech on Thursday morning. “The question is will it improve the lives of all Canadians or benefit only a few. That’s why we must take a positive, pragmatic and prudent approach that builds safe, reliable and sovereign AI for workers and businesses (and) for Canada and our allies.”
The government hopes its new AI strategy will generate an additional $200 billion of economic growth and create 250,000 new AI-related jobs over the next five years.
Business leaders have long called on the government to provide more support for homegrown companies to adopt AI, scale up and move to commercialization from research. The new plan establishes AI as a critical driver of productivity growth, especially for the small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) that make up the bulk of the Canadian economy and government services.
Some of the funding includes the Business Development Bank of Canada’s $500-million LIFT program to help businesses access financing to incorporate AI tools, a $700-million top-up of the Compute Access Fund to help SMBs access computing power and $500 million for a regional AI initiative to speed up adoption and commercialization countrywide.
The government hopes to grow business’s use of AI to 60 per cent by 2034, up from 12 per cent today.
Ottawa is also launching a $500-million Canadian Tech Growth Fund that will offer financing for high-potential companies and allow the government to take equity stakes in these businesses. The recently launched Sovereign Wealth Fund will also be used to support these companies “where appropriate,” the strategy document said.
More than 3,500 Canadian companies are actively developing AI models, tools and applications, and are collectively raising more than $37 billion in venture capital funding, the government said.
But only 34 per cent of Canadians are willing to trust AI and nearly 80 per cent is worried about the possible negative outcomes of AI, according to a 2025 study by KPMG International LLP and the University of Melbourne.
The government said it will introduce online safety laws and update new consumer privacy rules to protect Canadians and strengthen people’s control over personal data, but did not offer a timeline for doing so.
Ottawa will also give $50 million to the Canadian AI Safety Institute to “track emerging AI risks, advance technical research and conduct transparent evaluations of AI models.”
The federal government wants to create up to 90,000 AI-related job opportunities, with half of those being through the Student Work Placement Program and Canada Summer Jobs. More than $50 million will be directed to revamp Canada’s job bank with AI-powered job matching and to connect adults to free and low-cost AI courses.
The buildout of sovereign infrastructure continues to be a key focus for Ottawa as well.
The strategy said Canada is on track to build a new public supercomputer and will continue to advance the construction of large-scale AI data centres. It said partnerships are now being finalized to increase Canada’s computing capacity to 850 megawatts by 2030, “with scaling capacity of up to 2.3 gigawatts with corresponding investments in the tens of billions.”
On the global stage, Canada wants to push for closer ties with like-minded allies to build a “multinational sovereign technology alliance” and develop “sovereign autonomy in key AI capabilities,” the document said. Canada has already inked agreements with countries such as Germany to deepen cooperation on AI across research, infrastructure and capital.
The government said it received more than 11,000 submissions during its public consultation on AI and took into account recommendations from its AI strategy task force as well as other groups, including First Nations leaders and labour, AI safety and environmental organizations.
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