by Pamela Scott Crace

Are good ideas launched during a recession? You betcha. GE. The ballpoint pen. IBM. The Whopper. Wikipedia. To name just a few. These and more were mentioned in Fredericton at a recent capital markets summit convened by the New Brunswick Securities Commission. The agenda, in part: "what next" for entrepreneurship.

ChemGreen Innovation is a complex case in point. ChemGreen, a new process for making plastic without toxic vapours, is based on applied research from Mount A. The pitch recently attracted $125,000 worth of investment and professional services by winning New Brunswick's business plan competition, Breakthru.

ChemGreen's student team-members were at the Fredericton summit to network and help get the company off the ground. I spent some time talking to spokesperson Sally Ng, and her colleagues Niel Macintyre and Joshua Hamilton. They are all young, talented, and ambitious.

And they are the next business leaders of Atlantic Canada-smart, connected, passionate about the environment, addicted to social media-products of what futurist Don Tapscott calls the Net Generation. Such pundits proclaim this generation's influence could change the world more profoundly than any previous. Why? Because they adapt easily to new technology and they just get on with it.

But don't expect Sally and her teammates to necessarily stay in Atlantic Canada. They dream of following the money, and still see that yellow brick road leading elsewhere, even if their hearts are here.

Take Sally, for example: the 21-year-old graduates this spring with a commerce degree. She's class president. She is an officer in the Canadian Forces Reserves and trains cadets. She is only 15 hours away from a commercial pilot's licence. For now she's helping ChemGreen get incorporated so it can attract start-up capital. She also has a part-time job encouraging high school students to plan their post-secondary education early. This fall she's going to Tanzania with Canada World Youth. She plans to spend the next year there teaching and figuring out what to do next.

Call her accomplished. Call her a mentor. Call her a leader. But even with her ChemGreen street cred, don't call her an entrepreneur.

I asked why not. Entrepreneur, she says, is not a label she's comfortable with. It connotes a life of hard work with minimal return. It's risky. It is still seen by some as what you do if nothing else pans out.

This I believe is our challenge. Capital summits, business plan competitions, and economic development gabfests are part of the culture shift, but alone will not create the future we want. That future has more graduates like Sally Ng thinking that starting a business is a cool thing to do.