Regional food clusters and government support for clustering: Evidence for a ‘dynamic food innovation cluster’ in Alberta, Canada?

Bodo Steiner and Jolene Ali

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: Location-based clusters and virtual cluster configurations have received significant attention from policymakers due to their potential implications on productivity, innovation and regional growth. This paper presents a short review of studies that have analyzed clustering activity in the food sectors of several countries. The key insights from these studies with regard to the underlying factors for clustering success are contrasted with empirical evidence from the food processing sector of Alberta, Canada. This includes the presentation of results from an exploratory firm-level survey on government support for clustering activity in Alberta’s food. Considering the level of government support for innovation, the limited access to supporting business infrastructure, and the lack of effective networking between industry stakeholders, we find little evidence for an emerging innovation cluster in Alberta’s food industry.

Keywords: regional clusters; food processing; government support for innovation; Canada (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O18 O31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/26251/1/MPRA_paper_26251.pdf original version (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Regional Food Clusters and Government Support for Clustering: Evidence for a ‘Dynamic Food Innovation Cluster’ in Alberta, Canada? (2009)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:26251

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany Ludwigstraße 33, D-80539 Munich, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Joachim Winter ().