Friuli Venezia Giulia at the Forum in Canada on AI, a closer partnership

(Il Sole 24 Ore Radiocor) - Get hands-on with Canada's innovations and strengthen relations with one of the world's most advanced hubs for the development of artificial intelligence solutions. This is the heart of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region's mission at the seventh edition of the Canada-Italy Forum on Artificial Intelligence in Montreal. The event, which took place in November 2025 and was organised by the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Canada, focused on partnerships for technological development, with the aim of fostering public-private collaboration for innovation. "Quebec is one of the most advanced realities at a global level on the artificial intelligence front," explained Sebastiano Callari, Councillor for Information Systems of the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region, who led the institutional delegation, which also included the Select Friuli Venezia Giulia Agency and Insiel (the Region's in-house ICT company). This is also thanks to investments in research and development, to which the private sector makes an 'enormous' contribution, alongside the public sector. In Italia, on the other hand, total R&D expenditure is around 1.4 per cent of GDP (below the European average), with the public sector's share 'stuck at less than one per cent of GDP', Callari observes, emphasising that this 'is a major problem', which involves not only institutions but also companies. Therefore, 'Italian companies must be made to understand that they must push on innovation and invest to remain competitive'. Hence, the Region's objective is to also bring Friulian companies to the next Canada-Italy Forum to be held in the autumn of 2026. At the same time, says Callari, "through the Select Friuli Venezia Giulia Agency we have identified companies interested in investing in our Region. Representatives from Select Friuli Venezia Giulia took part in the event, also meeting with the vice-president of the foreign investment attraction agency Montreal International.

The Forum is part of a very favourable institutional framework for bilateral collaborations. In 2024, Italia and Canada signed an agreement aimed at accelerating strategic collaborations especially in technology-intensive sectors: theItaly Canada roadmap for enhanced co-operation. Also in 2024 - as a first result of the roadmap - a bilateral advisory board on Artificial Intelligence was launched, while, on the sidelines of the 2025 Canadian-led G7 summit, the heads of government of the two countries signed a Joint Statement reaffirming their willingness and interest in strengthening institutional, research and industrial collaborations. Moreover, Canada has been a formal full partner of Horizon Europe for two years now, which opens up new opportunities for Joint R&D, experimentation, and technology transfer. In particular, the Montreal metropolitan area is recognised as one of the world's most advanced hubs for AI, thanks to institutes of excellence such as Mila and Ivado, alongside an integrated system of innovative start-ups and SMEs and a Canadian supercluster specialising in AI for the supply chain and intelligent mobility. In addition, Big tech (Google, Microsoft and Meta) have chosen Montréal for their R&D centres.

Friuli Venezia Giulia "is one of the Italian regions that can best adopt the innovative model used in Quebec, because here there is already an important ecosystem made up of universities, research institutions, and a public administration that is considered a 'Strong Innovator' by the European Commission," emphasises Councillor Callari. With its participation in the Forum in Canada, Friuli Venezia Giulia has focused on the institutional accreditation of the regional model of digitalisation and innovation, alongside the mapping of opportunities for the definition of the regional roadmap and the subsequent development of internationalisation paths that enhance the strategic axes of the regional innovation ecosystem. For example, the implementation of artificial intelligence in public administration, smart digitisation, quantum technologies and data science. During the Forum, topics were discussed on how to improve wellbeing, health, environmental protection and how to manage emergencies in the region, save on energy resources, standardise processes to create new alliances and synergies to build sustainable biodiversity solutions. There was then a discussion on how AI can enhance resilience and security: from healthcare to cybersecurity, from energy to logistics. But AI must also be protected as an essential infrastructure.