International Trade committee  That gets into the details of specific areas. I focus on the symbolic importance of some of these issues, and you will know that Japan Post is a very visible part of the Japanese economy. Many people have their savings with them. You recall that under Prime Minister Koizumi posta

International Trade committee  International trade agreements are part of their larger strategy to ensure that they remain economically involved in the world. Canada is a large economy. It's a G-7, G-8 economy. Therefore, that was one of the aspects I highlighted as being of symbolic importance. If they are

International Trade committee  Not really, no. There are no concrete negotiations about that at the moment. This potential trilateral tie-up has been mentioned before. It would obviously be the beginning of a regional integration as well, which has been sought in Asia for some decades but has not really gotten

International Trade committee  If that was a question to me, it would be unusual to Japan to see the involvement of provinces, but I don't expect they would necessarily object. In the EU context obviously, to EU negotiators, with nation states behind them, provinces probably made a lot of sense to them, wherea

International Trade committee  Again, I would focus on the symbolic benefits. I know you heard testimony the other day from the Canadian forest sector on how they would benefit economically, but you're absolutely right to point to the initiatives that the forestry sector took in donating materials to rebuild o

International Trade committee  No one will ever match the symbolic importance of Anne of Green Gables in Japan, so whatever we might have in the west, you've got everything locked up and we will never compete.

International Trade committee  As you well know, agricultural trade is often the sticking point for some of these negotiations, and there are obviously other areas for Canada. Automobiles come to mind in the negotiations with Japan and the like. But this is clearly a difficult area, and this is really what h

International Trade committee  Yes, absolutely. You may have noticed that my title is actually Keidanren Chair because 20 years ago members of the Keidanren supplied the endowment that created the position I currently hold. The Keidanren is your rough equivalent of the Conference Board, if you will. When Mr.

International Trade committee  Prime Minister Noda has not quite staked his future on the consumption tax, but he has made this a big issue. If those measures don't pass, we would probably see the end of his role as prime minister. But then, we've seen a rapid turnover of Japanese prime ministers for some year

International Trade committee  Yes, absolutely, Mr. Wallace. Thank you. Yes, you're clearly right. For example, one of the sticky issues for Japan has always been rice, right? That's not an issue with Canada, to the extent that there just isn't much of an intention to export rice in large quantities to Japan.

International Trade committee  Thank you very much. As a teacher I'm always very happy to talk about student activities, and this was really a wonderful opportunity for students to engage and to collaborate. The way we set it up though, I have to tell you, was that we mixed up the teams. We had Canadian stude

International Trade committee  Mr. Sandhu, you're from Surrey, so you know for example how many English language students we get in Vancouver, and many of those come from Japan. When an agreement like this is signed, of course it enters the newspapers, and it's discussed in the media. All of that makes Canada

International Trade committee  Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Good afternoon. This is Julian Dierkes from Vancouver. Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee, thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to speak to you today. I want to speak to you a little bit about the perspective people mi

International Trade committee  I hear you just fine. Thank you.