Spending a few days recently in Barbados at the World Cup of Golf, I was reminded of one of our region’s greatest strengths. We were sitting in Fred Smithers’ beach house near Bridgetown when I realized the music playing in the background was one of Denis Ryan’s CDs. Ryan, known to many as an entrepreneur, stockbrocker, and investment counseller, was also in the room. Equally many will recognize Ryan as the former leader of Celtic music group Ryan’s Fancy and a larger-than-life East Coast personality.

The CD was filled with songs from Newfoundland and Ireland, and as we talked I began to think how distinct east Coast culture really is. Music, theatre, festivals, art, museums, film, television, and literature prevail throughout the Atlantica region. It’s rich and it’s deeply tied to our history, the ocean, hardship, war, the economy, First Nations, Europe, the Caribbean, and Africa.

Many places around the world are known for their culture — think France, Italy, Thailand — and their economies are successful as a result. France, for example, is the most-visited country in the world, with roughly 70 million visitors annually. Tourism thrives because of culture; visitors don’t go to a place to gaze at office towers and highway overpasses. And when a place is known for a strong, diverse, cultural community then businesses, universities, and hospitals are able to more easily attract better managers, administrators, and researchers.

Business can play a starring role in creating cultural vibrancy with partnership, as Grant Thornton LLP’s Canadian CEO and executive partner Alex MacBeath points out in this month’s cover story. Vibrant and interesting communities don’t just happen, he says,

and corporations should be active participants in building communities where the arts can thrive and where audiences can experience excellence. So committed is MacBeath’s organization to the arts, it recently extended its corporate sponsorship of the Moncton-based Atlantic Ballet Theatre of Canada for another five seasons, pledging a total investment of $400,000.

Companies that produce great cultural products become great exporters — film and television production houses, book publishers, music producers, and even a regional ballet company sell their wares in global markets and the profits return here. In other words, culture is good business.

Take Newfoundland comedy and Cape Breton music, for example, which have been popular around the world for years. People elsewhere experience it and are moved to come here to enjoy it firsthand. There are so many talented, artistic, and motivated people here. Investing in them and helping export their efforts should be a priority.

Culture is one of two sectors that, if properly developed, could contribute significantly to the growth of prosperity. Scientific research and innovation with commercial potential is the other. Both are environmentally clean industries that mainly require talented people and capital. And because they tend to be unique to us, they encounter less competition (unlike selling fish or lumber).

The rest of the world is moving at alarming speed growing economic, academic, and cultural might. For us to avoid being trampled or simply starved out of existence, we need to pick our winners and back them to the hilt.