This event has been made possible by the generous sponsorship of one of Atlantica’s cross-border success stories:
In this era of growing continental economic integration, those cross-border regions that learn to act as coherent economic units will maximise their prosperity while minimising the risk of damaging disruptions to trade and investment. AIMS’ Atlantica initiative is intended to help make Atlantic Canadians aware of the common problems we share with our American neighbours just across the border, and the important synergies we could realise through effective and concerted action.
AIMS, together with a coalition of community representatives from around the International Northeast Economic Region (or “Atlantica”), is partnering with Mr. Gallis to identify this cross-border region’s potential and how we might organise ourselves to best take advantage of it.
Michael Gallis has pioneered a specialty in helping public, private and institutional leaders to work effectively together to create globally competitive regions. He has mobilised leaders to understand and respond to the challenges and opportunities of regional commerce in the 21st century throughout North America. This is an excellent opportunity to hear one of the leading thinkers in this field discuss the potential of Atlantica in an intimate and off-the-record setting. I am confident you will find that Mr. Gallis’s vision is both powerful and illuminating.
Some of the points to be discussed in his talk:
- To compete in global and continental markets, local economies must organise and act in concert as broader regions;
- Atlantic Canada is part of a broader and definable international region that straddles the Canada-US border and hence has unique opportunities as well as vulnerabilities;
- Other regions throughout North America are ahead of us in achieving new levels of economic efficiency and coherence;
- How Atlantica can organise and advance as a coherent region, and how international developments promise us greater growth and prosperity if we take up that challenge.
After Mr. Gallis spoke, a panel of regional leaders responded to our guest’s vision of a new kind of international cooperation and collaboration in Atlantica.
Read selected portions of the transcription
Halifax, global revolution and the value engine
From the Silk Road to the Age of High Tech: The imperative of position in global trading patterns
The International Northeast Corridor: Eliminating a cul-de-sac in the global network
Left to right: AIMS president Brian Lee Crowley, Michael Gallis, US
Consul General in Halifax, Leonard Hill and AIMS’ Chair David Mann