[9] Of considerable potential impact to the future of the economy in Durham Region is the proposed federal airport in north Pickering.

The federal government acquired 18,600 acres of land in Pickering under Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau in 1972 for the construction of a future airport.

[10] In January 2018, a report released by Urban Strategies, Inc. indicated that the Pickering airport lands provide the best opportunity to meet the growing demand for air travel and goods movement in the Greater Toronto Area, demand that Toronto Pearson airport will eventually be unable to accommodate.

The film industry is active and growing in Durham Region, due to increasing demands for locations and talent across Ontario.

[21] Emerging employment sectors in Durham Region include sustainable energy, local food production, bio-sciences, next-generation automotive, logistics, advanced manufacturing, construction, and technology.

Oshawa is the Canadian headquarters of General Motors and home of what was once GM's largest plant in North America.

The worldwide recession and spike in oil prices resulted in large-scale layoffs at GM beginning in 2008, along with the closure of the Oshawa Truck plant in 2009.

On November 26, 2018, General Motors announced that no future product would be allotted to Oshawa beyond 2019 and that manufacturing operations would cease in December 2019.

In June 2019 OPG announced it would be building a new corporate campus in Durham Region, in the Municipality of Clarington, by 2024.

[26] In 2023, Ontario Power Generation announced they were changing plans and had purchased the former General Motors Canada head office building and were updating it to be their new corporate headquarters.

[33] Outdoor activities such as hiking and skiing are popular in the region, in particular in Uxbridge, Ontario, which calls itself the Trail Capital of Canada.

The port received around 50 lake freighters per year between 2007 and 2017 and acts as an export terminal for agricultural products from Durham and nearby regions.

Instead, as is true of all school boards in Ontario, they are separate entities with distinct but overlapped service areas.

Ontario Tech University is a science, technology engineering and math (STEM)-focused, research driven institution.

[37] Durham College has campuses in Oshawa and Whitby, and has nine academic schools across a wide range of disciplines.

[38] Trent University Durham offers full and part-time undergraduate programs, as well as post-graduate certificates.