Apr 5, 2022 | International
The theme for Canada’s participation at Expo 2020 Dubai, “The Future in Mind” was an invitation to reflect on how to address emerging challenges and seize opportunities for innovation. The Canada Pavilion welcomed visitors to discover the diversity, creativity, and openness of Canada as a destination to invest, do business, study, immigrate and visit.
April 04th, 2022, Ottawa, Ontario – Global Affairs Canada:
Canada is honoured to have participated in Expo 2020 Dubai, which successfully concluded after six months of operations.
The theme for Canada’s participation at Expo 2020 Dubai, “The Future in Mind” was an invitation to reflect on how to address emerging challenges and seize opportunities for innovation. The Canada Pavilion welcomed visitors to discover the diversity, creativity, and openness of Canada as a destination to invest, do business, study, immigrate and visit.
From the outset of Expo 2020 Dubai, the Canada pavilion was remarkable for its cultural programming, led by Canada’s National Arts Centre, including the participation of an all-Aboriginal delegation of artists, speakers, panelists and cultural contributors during Tolerance and Inclusion Week and the Te Aratini Festival of Indigenous & Tribal Ideas.
Recognized as one of the top countries in the world for the quality of its education programs, Canada’s participation in Expo’s Knowledge & Learning Week in December 2021 put a spotlight on its innovative contributions to global education. Under the banner of “Together for Learning @RewirEd”, Canada participated in events that touched on education in emergencies, catch-up and accelerated learning for out of school children, and gender-transformative education. These events prominently featured Canada’s priorities on girls’ education, especially in conflict and crisis.
On International Women’s Day (March 8, 2022), the Commissioner General for Canada at Expo 2020 Dubai, Marie-Geneviève Mounier and Canada’s Ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, Marcy Grossman commemorated Canada’s theme “Women Inspiring Women”. The theme celebrates the diverse women and girls who inspire us by demonstrating leadership in the choices they make in their day-to-day lives to contribute to the social, economic, cultural, and political spheres.
On March 19, the Governor General of Canada, Her Excellency the Right Honourable Mary Simon, led Canada’s delegation to its National Day at Expo 2020 Dubai. The Honourable Mary Ng, Minister of International Trade, Export Promotion, Small Business and Economic Development accompanied the Governor General during her visit to Expo 2020 Dubai.
The Canada Pavilion marked its National Day at Expo 2020 Dubai with a robust cultural and business program highlighting the economic, cultural and people-to-people ties between Canada, the United Arab Emirates and the broader Middle East region that are strengthened by Canada’s participation in Expo 2020 Dubai.
On March 20, the Canada Pavilion joined the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie, Expo 2020 Dubai, and the member pavilions of the Francophonie family, to mark the International Day of la Francophonie at Expo. This day was an opportunity to celebrate the French language, spoken by more than 320 million people on five continents, and to showcase the richness and diversity of Francophone cultures, including Canadian artists.
The UAE premiere of “Peace by Chocolate,” a Canadian film directed by Jonathan Keijser, and inspired by the true story of the Hadhad family, rounded out Canada’s National Day at Expo.
Throughout the six months of Expo, Canada’s commercial program was key in promoting Canadian exports and investment in Canada and helping Canadian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) find meaningful opportunities for their global expansion in the UAE and the Middle-East and North Africa region.
Led by Global Affairs Canada, Canada’s participation was enriched and made possible through partnerships with organisations such as Invest in Canada – a signature sponsor – the National Arts Centre, the National Film Board, Parks Canada, Ingenium, and many others that helped the Canada pavilion shine at Expo 2020 Dubai.
“Canada’s pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai was an important platform to promote all that Canada has to offer, as well as support our SMEs in their ambitions to expand internationally. Team Canada proudly showcased our cultural wealth and indigenous heritage to the world, and in our plans to drive economic recovery, Expo 2020 Dubai will play a valuable role, serving as a reminder to the world of the abundant opportunities Canada has for investors, immigrants, tourists and students.”
– Mary Ng, Minister of International Trade, Export Promotion, Small Business and Economic Development
“We are extremely proud of our participation at Expo 2020 Dubai where we focused on promoting Canada as an ideal place for education, immigration, business, investment and tourism. We presented the best of what our country has to offer to visitors from all over the world who will keep Canada in mind for decades to come.”
– Marie-Geneviève Mounier, Commissioner General of Canada, Expo 2020 Dubai
Jan 23, 2022 | International
The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs, today concluded her trip to Ukraine, France and Belgium, during which she met with European counterparts and reaffirmed Canada’s steadfast support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
January 21, 2022 – Brussels, Belgium – Global Affairs Canada
The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs, today concluded her trip to Ukraine, France and Belgium, during which she met with European counterparts and reaffirmed Canada’s steadfast support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity. This important work builds on engagement in recent weeks and months, including with NATO, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and G7 counterparts.
Minister Joly began her trip in Kyiv, Ukraine, where she met with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Prime Minister Denis Shmyhal, as well as with Olha Stefanishyna, Deputy Prime Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, Dmytro Kuleba, Minister of Foreign Affairs, and Andriy Yermak, Chief of Staff to President Zelenskyy, to discuss pressing issues facing the people of Ukraine, including the economic instability caused by Russia’s ongoing aggression and destabilizing activities. Minister Joly reaffirmed Canada’s intention to provide additional support to Ukraine.
Minister Joly made clear that Canada stands with Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression. Minister Joly underscored that Canada is resolute in its commitment to the preservation of global security, and she personally thanked those helping to safeguard it when she visited Canadian Armed Forces troops deployed to Canada’s training and capacity-building mission Operation UNIFIER.
In Paris, France, Minister Joly met with Jean-Yves Le Drian, France’s Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, to exchange perspectives on issues of common interest, namely Russia’s military buildup in and around Ukraine. The ministers agreed that the only viable path forward for Russia is to engage in meaningful dialogue and de-escalation. Minister Joly also met with Louise Mushikiwabo, Secretary General of La Francophonie, to discuss ways to better support democracy, human rights and gender equality in the francophone world.
To conclude her trip, in Brussels, Belgium, Minister Joly met with Jens Stoltenberg, Secretary General of NATO, to discuss NATO’s unified stance on Russia’s military buildup in and around Ukraine and NATO’s ongoing efforts to call on Russia to take steps to de-escalate the situation. She also met with Charles Michel, President of the European Council, Josep Borrell, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy/Vice-President of the European Commission, and Sophie Wilmès, Belgium’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, European Affairs and Foreign Trade. In these meetings, Minister Joly discussed the importance of defending multilateralism and the vital role of a co-ordinated responses in deterring Russian aggression in and around Ukraine, including through sanctions.
Throughout her visit, Minister Joly expressed her sincere thanks to her European counterparts for their warm welcomes, and she emphasized Canada’s unwavering commitment to the rules-based international order and to Euro-Atlantic security, including the security of Ukraine and its people.
The Minister will return to Canada on Saturday, January 22. All COVID-19-related public health rules and guidelines will be followed.
“Canada’s support for Ukraine is unwavering. In the face of Russian aggression, Canada is proud to stand with those who believe in Ukraine’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence. As I leave Belgium today, Canada’s commitment to Ukraine and its people is stronger than ever.”
– Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs
Jan 2, 2022 | Business
The Moving Picture, Audio and Data Coding by Artificial Intelligence (MPAI) standards developing organisation has concluded the year 2021, its first full year of operation approving its fifth standard for publication.
The standards developed and published by MPAI so far are:
1. Context-based Audio Enhancement (MPAI-CAE https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-cae/) – last approved – supports 4 identified use cases: adding a desired emotion to an emotion-less speech segment, preserving old audio tapes, restoring audio segments and improving the audio conference experience.
2. AI Framework (MPAI-AIF https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-aif/) enables creation and automation of mixed Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, Data Processing and inference workflows. The Framework can be implemented as software, hardware, or hybrid software and hardware.
3. Compression and Understanding of Industrial Data (MPAI-CUI https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-cui/) gives the financial risk assessment industry new, powerful and extensible means to predict the performance of a company several years into the future.
4. Multimodal Conversation (MPAI-MMC https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-mmc/) enables advanced human-machine conversation forms such as: holding an audio-visual conversation with a machine impersonated by a synthetic voice and an animated face; requesting and receiving information via speech about a displayed object; interpreting speech to one, two or many languages using a synthetic voice that preserves the features of the human speech.
5. Governance of the MPAI Ecosystem (MPAI-GME https://mpai.community/standards/governance/) lays down the rules governing an ecosystem of implementers and users of secure MPAI standard implementations guaranteed for Conformance and Performance, and accessible through the not-for-profit MPAI Store.
The Book “Towards Pervasive and Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence” (https:/www.amazon.com/dp/B09NS4T6WN) illustrates the results achieved by MPAI in its 15 months of operation and the plans for the next 12 months.
MPAI is currently working on several other standards, some of which are:
1. Server-based Predictive Multiplayer Gaming (MPAI-SPG https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-spg/) uses AI to train a network that compensates data losses and detects false data in online multiplayer gaming.
2. AI-Enhanced Video Coding (MPAI-EVC https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-evc/), a candidate MPAI standard improving existing video coding tools with AI and targeting short-to-medium term applications.
3. End-to-End Video Coding (MPAI-EEV https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-eev/) is a recently launched MPAI exploration promising a fuller exploitation of the AI potential in a longer-term time frame that MPAI-EVC.
4. Connected Autonomous Vehicles (MPAI-CAV https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-cav/) uses AI in key features: Human-CAV Interaction, Environment Sensing, Autonomous Motion, CAV to Everything and Motion Actuation.
5. Mixed Reality Collaborative Spaces (MPAI-MCS https://mpai.community/standards/mpai-mcs/) creates AI-enabled mixed-reality spaces populated by streamed objects such as avatars, other objects and sensor data, and their descriptors for use in meetings, education, biomedicine, science, gaming and manufacturing.
MPAI develops data coding standards for applications that have AI as the core enabling technology. Any legal entity supporting the MPAI mission may join MPAI (https://mpai.community/how-to-join/join/) if able to contribute to the development of standards for the efficient use of data.
Visit the MPAI web site (https://mpai.community/) and contact the MPAI secretariat (secretariat@mpai.community) for specific information.
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