Emerson announces new trade strategy for Canada
The National Post
Emerson announces new trade strategy for Canada
By Peter O’Neil, CanWest News Service
7 June 2007
OTTAWA - Trade Minister David Emerson, denouncing those who fear Canadians can’t compete internationally, announced Thursday a new strategy that includes the first free trade deal Canada has struck in six years.
Mr. Emerson stressed in a speech to a business audience that Ottawa will not abandon hope of a new agreement under the floundering Doha round of negotiations to strike a new agreement under the World Trade Organization.
But he said Canada is in jeopardy of being left behind other countries, like the U.S., Australia and Chile, that are cutting side trade deals.
"The WTO remains the single best avenue for trade liberalization for a small, trade-oriented economy like Canada’s," he said in the text of a lunchtime speech in Gatineau, Que.
"Regardless of how WTO negotiations turn out, we cannot sit on the sidelines. We’ve been a spectator for too long as market share is taken by competitors with more aggressive trade strategies."
He announced Thursday a new deal with the European Free Trade Association (Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein).
The deal gives Canadian firms "preferential access to a key market" but includes the phasing out over 15 years of a tariff protecting Canada’s shipbuilding industry.
The Swiss, he said, are the fifth-largest investor in Canada, and together the four countries engage in $11-billion in two-way trade annually with Canada.
It is Canada’s first free trade agreement with European partners.
Federal officials will also launch formal free trade negotiations with Columbia, Peru and the Dominican Republic, he said, and engage in free trade "discussions" with Caricom, which represents Caribbean countries.
The Conservative government will also take steps to improve the North American Free Trade Agreement with the United States and Mexico, as well as seek better access to the 27-country European Union, Canada’s second-largest trading partner after the U.S.
Mr. Emerson said Canada, which hasn’t struck a free trade deal since one was reached with tiny Costa Rica six years ago, will also pursue agreements with South Korea, Singapore, Vietnam and Indonesia.
According to the text, the minister lamented attacks on globalization from those who take an "inward, protectionist and parochial" approach to globalization.
"Perhaps it’s fear-fear of the unknown. Fear Canadians cannot compete. I think they are wrong. Canadians can and must compete with the best in the world," he said.
"And not just because our economic interests are at stake. Free and open commerce is also critical to fighting poverty, famine, disease and environmental degradation. That is how prosperity and technology are diffused to where they are needed."
