Friday’s edition of Brighter Life likes included a link to a new economic forecast from The Conference Board of Canada. The headline: Canada is not headed into a second recession. In fact, we can expect 2.1% gross domestic product (GDP) growth this year and 2.4% in 2012.

I had a chance to hear Glen Hodgson, senior vice-president and chief economist at The Conference Board of Canada, expand on those predictions at a conference hosted by the Canadian Pension & Benefits Institute in Ottawa the same day. He talked about the global economy: “In the near term, we’re in a mess,” he said. “A mess caused by policy failure.” And he talked about Canada: “We have our act together.”

Five highlights:

• The U.S. recovery will be slow as consumers and governments pay down debt. “They had a financial crisis, a bit of a recovery and now all the cracks are being revealed,” said Hodgson. “The inadequate supervision of the financial sector, the ongoing problems in the housing sector. It’s really tough out there.” The U.S. will experience the kind of slow recovery that typically follows a financial crisis. Growth this year will be under 2%. Next year could strengthen to about 2.5% annual growth.

• Japan may have to pull funds out of capital markets. The government will have to spend so much to repair its tsunami-wrecked infrastructure that the country’s ability to invest overseas could be effected in the short-term.

• Latin America, Asia and Africa are good news stories. Hodgson said some countries could see annual growth rates as high as 8%. Credit China, India and Brazil, which continue to fuel growth domestically and internationally.

• Greece will almost certainly default. The government’s fiscal deficit was 14% of GDP in 2009. Its target for this year is 6% of GDP, but it’s not on-track to make that goal. Part of the problem is that the economy is shrinking, which means tax revenues are taking a hit. “I don’t see any way that Greece can avoid a formal default on their bank debt,” said Hodgson.

• Canadian consumers and governments will pay down debt in the near term. This will hurt economic growth, obviously, but not enough to shrink GDP. Also, don’t expect much activity from the Bank of Canada anytime soon. Hodgson said it won’t raise interest rates until mid-2012, or perhaps even later. And we won’t see quantitative easing, as has been the case in the U.S.