In June 2025, and in anticipation of the G7 Leaders Summit, the Academies of Science of the G7 issued the Ottawa Declaration, emphasizing that the mobility of researchers and the collaborations across borders accelerate discovery, knowledge creation and innovation.
In November 2025, the RSC announced the formation of a Task Force on Knowledge System Resilience. Modelled on the RSC Task Force on COVID-19, and led by experts from across Canada, the Task Force on Knowledge System Resilience will work regionally, nationally and globally in order to generate expert-driven insights aimed at a variety of audiences including the public and policymakers. The work of the multidisciplinary and international task force will address four questions:
- How can we better understand what is threatening independent, evidence-based knowledge, and how can we reduce those threats while also finding new ways to advance innovation?
- How can the public, policymakers, institutions, and researchers work together to rebuild and strengthen public trust and support for our knowledge systems?
- How can we best support artists, scientists, and scholars at all career stages so they can continue their work despite challenges, and find new ways to innovate?
- How can policymakers and institutions make robust knowledge creation faster and more useful for everyone in society?
Over the next year, the Task Force will commission and publicly share working papers, reports, policy briefs and data sets, deploying a variety of communications vehicles. An interim symposium will be planned for the spring of 2026 to highlight work-to-date and connect with the meeting of the G-7 Academies. The Task Force will produce a summary report by the spring of 2027.
The mandate and terms of reference of the task force are here.
Are you interested in contributing to this work? If so, please send a brief paragraph describing your broad area of expertise and your thoughts on the contributions you could make to Russel MacDonald at rmacdonald@rsc-src.ca by January 23, 2026.