The Canadian province of Quebec is making a strong pitch for itself as a region of economic growth, wealth creation for businesses and availability of high-end jobs. And for highly skilled Indians, entrepreneurs and companies from India looking at creating a North American hub, Quebec offers big advantages.

“We are strongly committed to the Indian market. We feel that Indian companies that decide to set up shop in Quebec can tap into our very talented and creative workforce that has helped our region emerge as a hub for high-end services such as gaming software and film production. We are in a strong position to offer a range of advantages to Indian companies in areas such as biotech and top end IT services,” Jacques Daoust, president and CEO of Investissement Quebec, an organisation that promotes growth of investment in Quebec and contributes towards creation of jobs and economic growth, told ET.

Recently, the Premier of Quebec Jean Charest and French President Nicolas Sarkozy signed an unprecedented agreement in Quebec City governing the recognition of professional qualifications. Under the agreement, France and Quebec will adopt a common procedure for recognising professional qualifications, thus making it quicker and easier to obtain a permit to practice a regulated profession or trade in either jurisdiction. While this will help students and professionals in moving between Quebec and France without any problems, Indian professionals based in Europe or Canada, too, can benefit from the arrangement to move between Europe and North America.

“Developing human capital and attracting the best talent from around the world is very important for us in Quebec. We have ourselves nurtured high-end talent and the employment situation is very bright with 75,000 top end jobs created in the last five years. Business start-up and operating costs too are extremely low and we have hubs of excellence in life sciences, health and nutrition, IT, geomatics, optics & photonics and biotechnology. We are in a position to compete with all global centres of excellence when attracting top talent from across the world and offer an added advantage of a bilingual work environment where both French and English are equally acceptable. Besides, we are competitive in terms of cost of living in comparison to America and families of immigrants find it very easy to integrate into the mainstream in our cities such as Quebec City and Montreal.

Both the federal and provincial immigration programmes help new immigrants and their families with fast track processes – including finding jobs for qualified spouses and schools for children,” said Carl Viel, president & CEO of POLE Quebec Chaudiere-Appalaches, an organisation that stimulates wealth creation, encourages entrepreneurship and develops strategic approaches in the areas of innovation, investment, marketing and workforce training, focusing on three sectors of excellence – health and nutrition, manufacturing and applied technologies.

The tax holiday scheme for foreign experts that is offered by the Quebec government is very attractive for skilled immigrants and provides an advantage for Indians in sectors such as IT and high-end research. Under this unique scheme, the Quebec government offers a 100% personal income-tax holiday for the first two years to foreign experts. In the third year, it is a 75% tax holiday and 50% in the fourth year. For the fifth year, the tax holiday works out to 25%. The province of Quebec has a very high employment rate (61% in 2007) and is actively looking at import of skill through immigration to boost human resources because it has a low birth rate.

Some of the highlights of the Quebec government’s policy to attract companies from emerging markets such as India include incentives for recruitment and training such as bearing 25% of all training costs and 50% of all recruitment costs. Besides, the Canadian government overall offers tax credits to companies on all R&D expenditure. Quebec, which has big business links with France and other countries in Continental Europe, is also positioning itself as an entry point to both North American and Continental European markets for Indian companies that set up shop there.

“There’s a wide range of sectors including clean energy, forestry, mining, aerospace, biotechnology, wind power and of course IT services where the province of Quebec offers huge opportunities for Indian companies to set up shop and for Indians to find jobs,” Mr Daoust said. And as a clear signal of the confidence in the Indian economy, Investissement Quebec is going ahead with its plan of opening an office in Mumbai soon and is not putting the project on hold despite the global economic slowdown.

Quebec has emerged as a North American hi-tech hub with more than 2700 IT firms employing over 11,000 people. Montreal is recognised as one of the world’s most competitive regions in telecom equipment, software development, internet and multimedia industries. And even though traditionally Indian immigrants have settled in areas around Toronto, Ottawa and Vancouver in Canada; the new generation of highly-skilled professionals from India are finding cities such as Montreal and Quebec City to be attractive destinations as well.

Some of the advantages that Indian businesses that set up shop in Quebec enjoy are an outward-looking economy, a highly skilled labour force, competitive operating costs and an advantageous corporate tax system. “We wanted to focus on the growing business and trade ties specifically between the province of Quebec and India and hence have set up a separate business council rather than function as a chapter of the larger India-Canada Chamber of Commerce,” Ms Crasto added. To immigrate to Quebec as an entrepreneur, an applicant has to have lawfully acquired net assets of at least C$300,000.

Courtesy: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/