Mr. Chairman, I thank the government House leader for giving all parliamentarians the opportunity to take part in this take note debate on the upcoming ministerial conference of the World Trade Organization in Doha.
We are leaving on Wednesday for Qatar. I have the honour of leading a Canadian delegation of over 65 people representing parliament and the Senate, non-government organizations and industry.
All countries and all regions, from east to west and north to south, will be represented and will be able to speak during this negotiation. It will be very useful for us, who hope to truly launch a new round of negotiations, to be able to consult Canadians who have myriad opinions and who will have different viewpoints to express to us.
I tabled our government's objectives before the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade on October 24. Our government's objectives and mandate to negotiate are clear. Obviously, our basic objective is to launch a new round of multilateral negotiations.
Two years ago in Seattle, we were unfortunately unable to launch a new round of negotiations. I think the primary victims of this failure were the developing countries, the poorest countries, the very countries trying to gain better market access to ensure their development because trade and development are intrinsically bound.
Canada therefore is totally committed to launching this new round of negotiations. I hope we will achieve success by the end of this week and next week in Doha.
We are in a difficult environment worldwide. Of course, since September 11, the world has changed significantly. With the economic slowdown, which we were experiencing prior to September 11 and which has deepened since then, regrettably, it is vital we send a positive signal to the world economy, one that expresses our hope and belief that trade will lead to development and will help our economy to recover. I think the timing of this meeting is extremely important.
We have a number of problems in Canada. We have a bilateral disagreement on the softwood lumber issue which we talked about during question period.
People sometimes wonder about the relevance of the WTO. The WTO is a rules based system used to conduct our trade. It helps our bilateral relationship with the United States. People ask what the relevance is because Canada has a free trade agreement with the United States.
The answer is that it helps us in situations like the one we have with softwood lumber and the producer problem with tomato growers in British Columbia and Ontario trying to export to the United States.
Sometimes our major trade partner makes life more difficult for us. It is very important to be able to go to the WTO and its objective body of international panels that can apply the rules we believe in. The WTO is very useful even though we have a bilateral free trade agreement with the United States. Trade is very important because it improves the lives of Canadians.
It is remarkable to see how much public support we have in Canada for our efforts in the area of trade. Over 70% of Canadians are in favour of freer trade.
Trade is absolutely necessary to our economic growth, prosperity and social well-being. Without more trade, we are very much curtailing our potential growth. We are a trading country. We are the most trade dependent country, but dependency is a positive thing. Often, the term “dependency” has a pejorative ring to it.
The fact that 46% of our GDP is made up of exported goods and services means that we export far more than Germany, France or Japan, whose exports are proportionally far less than Canada's. This means that we need to have a round of negotiations.
We are leaving with a very important objective in agriculture. The minister of agriculture will also be in the delegation. The top priority of the government is to make sure that we can negotiate a major agricultural trade system for the world. That would be good for developing countries.
That is what our farmers need. We need to do away with export subsidies that are a folly. They distort international markets and penalize our farmers from east to west. We intend to make that a very top priority. I am delighted that the minister of agriculture will be joining me in Qatar to pursue the interests of our farmers.
We will be negotiating goods and services which are very important. We need to make progress in this area. More of our exports are in services, engineers, architects, environmental technologies and all sorts of products that are an important part of our economy.
We have held extensive consultations on the World Trade Organization and other agreements such as the free trade area of the Americas. We have, of course, met with business organizations directly affected by the negotiations in which we are involved. We have also met with groups of consumers, who are always interested in freer trade in order to have access to quality products from all over the world. We have met with interest groups and NGOs in order to ensure that we understood their point of view as well. They have some very pertinent questions for us. It is vital to have a dialogue that will keep Canada in the remarkable trade position it enjoys throughout the planet.
I believe that this next round of negotiations will focus on development. I do not think another round is possible unless we do far more for the poorest countries on the planet. I think it is vital for us to give them more access to our markets. There is nothing better for development than trade. Trade leads to development.
We must also enhance, and we are doing so through CIDA, the Canadian International Development Agency, the ability of southern countries so that they fully benefit from their joining the World Trade Organization. This is why Canada has worked so hard to solve several implementation issues that we experienced with previous agreements.
However, in order to settle all implementation issues, we need a new round of negotiations because some of the changes asked by southern countries involve a rebalancing of rights and obligations. This makes it necessary to begin a new round to find solutions to some of their demands.
I will conclude by saying that health and education are top priorities for Canada when we discuss trade and services. Our country will not negotiate public health and education. As far as we are concerned, these are not negotiable. They are areas which we have absolutely no intention of negotiating in Doha. They are not part of the Canadian objectives of our mandate. We want to be at the table to define these rules so Canadian businesses that want to export goods and services in the areas of health and education can benefit from these rules. A number of countries may decide to import. This is why we want to be at the table, but it is out of the question for us to go in that direction.
I wish to add a few words regarding the cultural industry. Members will hear many of my colleagues on this side of the House speak about our position on agriculture services investment, but I wish to speak about our cultural industry for a moment.
The Canadian government is committed to maintaining the flexibility we need to achieve our cultural goals. The government will not make any commitment that restricts our ability to achieve our cultural policy objectives. This is why we are pursuing the creation of an international instrument that would safeguard the right of countries like Canada to promote and preserve a diversity of cultural expression.
We are enthusiastic as we leave for the Doha meeting. The Canadian delegation is representative of the whole country. I hope the world will hear this signal that the international economy will get better because we will have better and sounder rules to deal with international trade and to promote liberalization to allow southern countries to further develop.
