Economic revival: assistance programs for the preservation of your activities

Many assistance programs are available to help you stay in business and innovate in times of economic revival. Vestechpro provides you with a summary of these various government programs and valuable advice to keep your business on the road to growth!

Benefit from credits and loans

• The Business Credit Availability Program (BCAP) provides additional support through the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) and Exportation Development Canada (EDC).
• The new Canada Emergency Business Account will provide up to $40,000 in interest-free loans.
• Canada Emergency Commercial Rent Assistance (CECRA) will reduce rents by 75% for small businesses whose activities have been affected by the COVID-19 crisis.

Funding envelopes have also been put in place to help young entrepreneurs, businesses in rural communities, businesses in the territories, and all small and medium-sized businesses that cannot access other support measures.

Retain, recruit and train your employees 

In order to maintain current jobs and rehire employees, several subsidies are available, such as the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS). This generally covers 75% of an employee's salary. The 10% Temporary Wage Subsidy for Employers reduces the amount of payroll deductions required to be remitted to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA). In addition, the Work-Sharing program has been extended. This program provides income assistance for your employees who have had to reduce their hours of work. Finally, employee training is an opportunity during this period. Many training courses are available online, and will help your employees to face the crisis. Discover PACME-COVID-19, a concerted action program for job retention. It is a "direct financial support to promote training and the implementation of good practices in human resources management, and to optimize the performance of businesses and the labour market."

To help you find your way around, you can also answer a few questions online to find out what help is best suited to your needs. >> I can find support mechanisms and other programs and services related to COVID-19 for my business.

Find a summary of government and Montreal aid measures here. In addition, a website has been created by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce specifically to help businesses during this crisis. You will find a lot of useful information and advice to guide you on the path to resilience.

Innovation as a key to recovery

This particular context must be conducive to innovation, so learn about the assistance programs available on this subject. Canada has made $250 million available to innovative start-up companies. The program provides advice and financing to help Canadian small and medium-sized businesses increase their innovative capacity and bring their ideas to market. Apply here. With "Futurpreneur Canada," a $20 million fund will support innovators and other start-up companies that do not qualify for the wage subsidy. Read more here. The Ministry of Economy and Innovation always offers support for innovation projects. Find out about the conditions here. We also strongly encourage you to apply to the Fonds de soutien à l'innovation en santé et en services sociaux (FSISSS) if you are concerned about the needs of the health sector. There are never too many good ideas when it comes to serving the well-being of the community.

We hope that this non-exhaustive summary will have enabled you to see more clearly the aid programmes available. The Vestechpro team remains ready to accompany you in the development of innovative projects, do not hesitate to contact us: contact@vestechpro.com. Furthermore, in order to take action, we invite you to discover our article "5 Effective Strategies to Support Recovery".