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• HBHC Evaluation

Governments encourage research and development through a number of direct and indirect mechanism. Maximizing the value derived from expenditures in support of R&D is a concern. The Social and Policy Research division of TNS Canadian Facts projects have assisted government in these areas:

• The Role of Government in Science and Technology Activities from an Economic Perspective articulates the economic rationale for activities in support of R&D. This rationale is based on market failure-the inability of markets to capture fully all relevant social benefits and costs. The result is that the marketplace under supplies R&D without government help. We also developed a checklist so that research managers could select projects best fitting this rationale among projects competing for scarce resources.

• The Canadian Centre for Mineral and Energy Technology is a government laboratory in support of R&D. We conducted cost-benefit analyses of a handful of its best projects in our Review of Selected CANMET Research and Development Projects. We then assessed how many years of CANMET activities were paid for by the net benefits of these projects.

• For the Department of Finance and Revenue Canada we carried out a Survey of Scientific Research and Experimental Development Claimants. A major component of the study involved assessing the incrementality of the system of SR&ED tax incentives, and the cost-effectiveness of tax credits and deductions that are provided.