Since the pandemic, the manufacturing industry in Canada has had to make some drastic shifts to keep up with the new demand, and the backlog of consumer wants, but technology has also shifted substantially to facilitate teleworking, and numerous other innovations that made their debut. Manufacturing in Canada was due for an overhaul, especially with the direction implications Covid had on our industry. The restrictions resulting from the pandemic affected 85.2% of manufacturing plants, combined with flooding in B.C. which further affected 28.1%, and the following protests against the health measures, which affected an additional 17.7%. Canadian manufacturers need to reorganize and re-establish themselves, as leading into the last 2 years the entire manufacturing sector has seen a record jump in sales, their highest point to date in all of 2022. Despite the highest level of recorded manufacturing sales in North America, the industry is not out of the woods yet. There are still numerous shortages caused by global supply chain issues which are impacting the industry mainly dealing with computer components. Despite these upsets that everyone is aware of, the pandemic has forced manufacturers to revitalize how they function to prevent or offset any production disruptions like this in the future. In the interim, these new developments may be slow to become integrated, but as they do, production will slowly return to normal. While this is happening, prices for manufactured goods have skyrocketed due to market demand, and shortages of supply.
According to the National Association of Manufacturers, because of the pandemic, manufacturers had forecasted that more than half of their operations would be impacted. Considering that, the main focuses that the manufacturing industry should prioritize are 3D printing and mechanization technologies. This will allow them to be more flexible, scalable, and automated which will not only facilitate dealing with potential future situations like another pandemic but also simply render current manufacturing practices more streamlined. This industry relies heavily on hands-on human labour, which would not only be rendered more efficient with the introduction of AI-driven production but increase the skillsets of the people who previously handled the manual process of manufacturing. Contrary to the common belief that this would in fact create job losses, it would not only do the opposite but increasing productivity means a higher quality of sustained business growth. Simple economics state that if you increase your capability to create higher quality goods at a more sustainable rate while lessening the chance of production disruption then consumers will purchase more.
This entire process reduces the costs and prices of goods and services, making consumers feel more economically wealthy resulting in them spending more which in turn would lead to the creation of more jobs. Overall, it’s beneficial and a total counterpoint to the argument that automation will put people out of work. Now, discussing the introduction of automation without at least touching on how employees can be kept on in your workforce would be irresponsible, and this is where re-education comes in. Automation of processes in a manufacturing sense does not mean that you need to fire employees, in fact, it actually means that you can then offer your employees classes and opportunities to fit into their new environment and pivot from their old position to a newer, often much more interesting and lucrative role is now needed. Not only will these kinds of initiatives improve your productivity and increase profits, but it allows you to revitalize your workforce, further improving productivity by offering much more mentally stimulating positions to employees and keeping them from venturing towards employee fatigue, or boredom.
This change of focus will only help in driving up sales, and subsequently, as local manufacturers begin to implement these new measures to revitalize their industry, costs will drop, which will only increase profits, at least in the interim, until the retail value of goods begins to match the production value. At the moment, the sales increase rose to 27.8% which as mentioned earlier comes on the back of the largest decline in almost a decade in the manufacturing industry which has been steadily increasing since about 2015. Even according to the Canadian Government, there is a Restart, Recover, and Reimagine plan of action. This initiative is going to help industries like manufacturing keep up with the growing trend of being environmentally conscious, and fighting climate change, all while digitizing as many processes as possible. To do this, however, these initiatives will need an influx of modern technology to not only keep their industries competitive but also profitable for all those involved. This also means keeping the manufacturing industry competitive as the world has gotten exponentially smaller since the pandemic, despite already having begun to shrink since the 4th industrial revolution began taking place, and the age of everything digital took over. As Claude Theroux, the CTO of Cubeler mentioned,
“Technology has changed in huge ways over the last 20 years, and we’re still seeing advancements almost daily. When looking at manufacturing, the same increases in production, making it faster and more efficient, apply just as within any other industry that incorporates modern technology. Added to that, we’re not only using more advanced machinery but the software behind that machinery, the AI, is becoming more advanced as well. It all leads to an overall better business process.”
The improvements in productivity and efficiency are not only beneficial to the manufacturing industry in order to compete on the global stage, which has gotten markedly smaller as previously mentioned, but the increased price points due to demand while slowly curtailing the production issues and still keeping up with a healthier and more sustainable manufacturing system will only go to drastically boost the profits of Canadian manufacturers. There are short-term losses that may be incurred, the cost of overhauling outdated equipment with newer, more efficient, and cleaner versions, but the end result will be the same: greater profitability and output that keeps up with modern consumer wants. To make things easier, we can always start with the manufacturing sector that we’re already a leading competitor in: the production of natural resources necessary for the manufacturing industry itself. Effectively, without us (Canadians), the whole system that manufacturing relies on would falter quite a bit, even compared to our southern counterparts. If we can ramp up that sector of manufacturing, or corner the market maybe a little more, we may be able to increase Canada’s standing as a global manufacturer.
