Doing Business

With stable and sustainable economic growth, increased investment in infrastructure, a strong housing market, long-term planning taking place, a more competitive business environment and a renewed sense of optimism and activity – the Regina region is rapidly becoming one to watch.

Regina has an incredible amount of potential for many industries and a savvy investor will recognize the potential of the Regina and Region as it begins to rapidly grow.  Emerging industries and technologies along with a growing labour force and population are making Regina into a community of choice for doing business.  Businesses are also starting to make the choice of a higher quality of life for their employees.

Why Regina?

Short-term Success in Regina, Saskatchewan

So what is the important distinction that makes Regina so desirable?  We believe that answer lies in the very nature and fundamentals of the Saskatchewan and Regina economies.

To begin, let’s analyze the short-term case for investment in Regina.  Obviously the biggest piece of the puzzle is in the strength of the local economy.  Regina is among those cities leading the country in growth.  Moreover, this growth is expected to continue.

This growth isn’t just limited to one or two sectors either.  It seems to be right across the board.  While we have this multi-sectoral growth, there is one sector which is growing rapidly and is expected to fuel our provincial and local economies into the future.  We believe that astute management of our province’s resources will ultimately benefit our people, our investors, and our country.  With a strong foundation for our economy, we shall also be able to focus on expansion in other industries to achieve a sufficiently diversified economy.

Long-term Success in Regina, Saskatchewan

While we believe the short-term possibility for excellent returns on investment exist in Regina, there is a distinction between the economies of Saskatchewan (and Alberta for that matter) and the rest of Canada that we think gives Regina and Saskatchewan an edge across the nation in the long-term.  And that answer is resources combined with astute, diversified, economic development and investment in infrastructure.  Saskatchewan’s resources combined with growing manufacturing and other Goods sector industries make the province’s potential growth into the future very strong.

In many ways, the manufacturing sector has been an economy powerhouse throughout our country in the past fifty years.  Yet, Saskatchewan’s manufacturing has been coming on strong in the past several years and has been experiencing steady and, more importantly, sustainable growth.  This plays further into growth in the Goods Industries in Saskatchewan.  The Conference Board estimates that the Goods sector was 36.3% of Saskatchewan’s GDP in 2006 exceeded only slightly by Alberta’s Goods GDP as a percentage of the entire economy.

Perhaps a more important distinction to make, however, is the difference in Primary Industry.  Primary Industry includes the resources of which we spoke and contributes to a significant advantage the Saskatchewan economy has in the long run.  Saskatchewan was number one in 2006 and is expected to excel into the future in producing a substantial portion of our economy through Primary Industry. 

In many ways, you can build a manufacturing economy or an economy based on and providing various services but one either has the resources or not.  Saskatchewan has the resources and we’ve shown that we’re capable – slowly but surely – of building our manufacturing and services economy to create a diversified and, in the long-term, powerful regional economy.

Saskatchewan Resources

The resources available in Saskatchewan have the capability to generate strong returns for the region and, in comparison to other jurisdictions throughout the nation, a significant long-term competitive advantage.  Although the focus of late seems to be on the significant oil resources found in both Saskatchewan and Alberta, the package of resources in Saskatchewan is much more expansive that this:

·          Oil (Saskatchewan is the second-largest producer behind Alberta)
·          Natural Gas (Saskatchewan is the nation’s third-largest producer)
·          Coal (Canada’s third-largest producer)
·          Uranium (Saskatchewan has about one-third of the world’s production of uranium)
·          Potash (Saskatchewan has about one-third of the world’s reserves of potash)
·          Gold (Significant deposits in northern SK)
·          Base Metals (including Copper, Zinc, Lead, Nickel)
·          Platinum Group Metals (Platinum and Palladium predominantly)
·          Rare Earth Elements (about 10% of US demand alone for Yttrium)
·          Diamonds
·          Kaolin
·          Forestry (for biomass, lumber, value-added)
·          Alternative Energy Capability (significant solar and wind)

In short, Saskatchewan is one of the world leader’s in energy and environmental resources.  Not only do we have significant reserves of many valuable resources, Saskatchewan has a much diversified resource economy.  For example, our significant oil deposits are a large part of our energy portfolio; yet, this same portfolio is successfully diversified with alternative energy resources including nuclear, solar, wind, and hydrogen (from both our technological research and advancements and natural gas).

It is our belief that the growth in the Regina region and, more generally, in Saskatchewan is going to be not only strong but sustainable.  We believe that the managed growth of our manufacturing and goods sectors can be maintained and powered by our impressive resource economy.  Essentially, Saskatchewan has both the “resource economy” and the growing “manufacturing economy” which are requisite for growth into the long-term.  As the capital city of the province, Regina is poised to take advantage of this enormous growth potential.

General Business Links

Regina Chamber of Commerce
Saskatchewan Industry and Resources
Progress2Capital Business Planning Competition
Women Entrepreneurs of Saskatchewan 
Saskatchewan Indian Equity Foundation 
Entrepreneurial Foundation of Saskatchewan
Centre for Business Development
Conseil de la Cooperation de la Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan Trade & Export Partnership