June 13, 2024

SASKATOON, SK ? The Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce has released “Fueling Momentum 2024”, a policy platform for the 2024 Provincial Election. The platform is based on data from consultations and research, undertaken by the Chamber with members and the Saskatchewan business community. It is intended to provide all Saskatchewan political parties with information on the priorities of Saskatchewan businesses.

“This is a pivotal time for the province. We are positioned to become a critically important partner in addressing global food insecurity and energy transition. Over the coming four years, the Saskatchewan government needs to continue to capitalize on the province’s vast potential to fuel growth and new investment,” said Prabha Ramaswamy, CEO, Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce.

The Fueling Momentum 2024 platform focuses on maintaining and implementing policies that help to position Saskatchewan to take advantage of the many opportunities facing the province.

“There are tremendous opportunities ahead for Saskatchewan, but it is imperative that we build a competitive business climate that supports growth of small, medium, and large businesses in the province. We need to encourage faster adoption of solutions and policies necessary to continue the fueling of our next decade of growth,” said Ramaswamy.

The platform features five pillars that are foundational to the province’s growth. Each pillar includes several recommendations:

Laying the Foundation for Growth: Competitive taxes and affordable living
1. Reduce the Provincial Sales Tax (PST) from 6% to 5%
2. Reduce the corporate income tax rate to 10%
Leveraging Our Strengths: Food, Fuel, Fertilizer (and critical minerals)
1. Maintain a stable regulatory and royalty regime encouraging development and increased investment in Saskatchewan.
2. Continue diversifying export markets for Saskatchewan’s mining products by exploring new trading partners and reducing reliance on traditional markets.
3. Commit to implementing a strategy to ensure equity among the property classes to increase competitiveness and economic growth.
4. Combine the resource class with the existing commercial/industrial class for Education Property Taxes and retain the latter’s lower mill rate of 6.86.
5. Review/enhance Saskatchewan’s value-added agriculture incentive programs to ensure they remain competitive with other jurisdictions in North America.

Attract and Grow Investment
1. Increase Saskatchewan’s red tape reduction savings target to between $20M and $40M annually.
2. Create a government procurement policy that enables right-size opportunities for Saskatchewan companies.
3. Implement a non-refundable tax credit of up to 50% for individuals and corporations. Eligible businesses must have less than 50 full-time employees and a minimum of 50% of employees must reside in the province.
4. Undertake a thorough analysis of the local vendor supply chain to identify where local vendors may not have capacity to meet expectations, and develop plans including infrastructure investments, to address identified gaps.
Energy Transformation
1. Increase support for research and development of small modular reactor (SMR) technologies.
2. Create space to facilitate direct partnerships between private renewable energy generators, including Indigenous-owned power generators, and businesses that do not require Crown involvement.
3. Expand incentives for Saskatchewan-based small and medium sized enterprises to reduce emissions and enhance the sustainability of their operations.

Invest in What Matters
1. Ensure resources are available to support the timely processing of an expanding number of Saskatchewan Immigrant Nominee Program (SINP) applications.
2. Find a balance between protecting youth and encouraging early labour force engagement. The Chamber recommends lowering the age that youth are able to work, to 13 years of age or above, and applying the appropriate changes to the Young Workers Readiness Certification Course.

According to Ramaswamy, one of the most critical factors to supporting Saskatchewan in achieving its potential, is the confidence of business owners.

“Implementing policies to increase business confidence will be critical to increasing business investment, which is essential to fully realizing the opportunities available in Saskatchewan,” she said.

The Chamber will be using the content of the “Fueling Momentum 2024” policy platform in all its advocacy work with political parties in the province, on behalf of Saskatchewan businesses, over the next five months.

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