atlantic canada

Host Mark Leger has always wanted to connect with Mario Thériault for a chat about his wide-ranging career. Mario was a broadcast journalist in the early days, a published poet and short story writer, a communications adviser to his brother and one-time premier of New Brunswick, Camille Thériault, and for the last 20 years, the founder and CEO of the Moncton market intelligence firm ShiftCentral. Mario sold the company to U.S.-based LAC Group in 2019 and stayed on as Chief Business Development Officer. Mark finally caught up with Mario after he was recently named chair of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce. They talked about politics, writing, and building a business that reaches global markets from the Maritimes.

The UNB economics professor accepted his job to come here from Alberta just as MacLean’s was publishing its much-loathed article, “Can anything save New Brunswick?”, about whether the province’s economy was in permanent decline. On this week’s episode, Herb tells host Mark Leger he arrived here to find that all was not lost. We just need to understand that the foundations of our manufacturing economy are strong and that traditional businesses need to be appreciated and nurtured, not cast off as “sunset” industries dominated by big players unfairly labelled as “monopolies.”

Atlantic Canada’s airports got more bad news this week with WestJet indefinitely suspending service to Moncton and Fredericton and cutting back on service to Halifax and St. John’s. Derrick Stanford is the CEO of the Saint John Airport and president of the Atlantic Canada Airports Association. Derrick joins host Mark Leger to talk about why airports are an essential part of a robust, growing economy, and how we can do more to support them. Mark and Derrick also look forward to a time when the industry is on the rise again and they can rest easy in a sun destination of their choice.