International Trade committee  As I said to you, in our push to the department, the regional offices are the critical link to the SMEs. We can't expect every embassy in the world to communicate directly with every region in Canada, but we can expect the regional offices to know their region and to develop communication technologies and outreach programs.

International Trade committee  It's always a great day in Saskatchewan.

International Trade committee  Absolutely. There is no problem with the list being public. We will have that list provided to the members of the committee. This is not a confidential issue.

International Trade committee  Glen, do you want to go first, or do you want me to go first?

International Trade committee  Okay. Ultimately, the advice I give to SMEs always is that there needs to be a focus to your business. You can't be in 108 countries at the same time. We were benefiting from a program that was focused on export at first, and then we identified assets and customers that we actually went out and acquired.

International Trade committee  Certainly; there is no problem there— [Technical difficulty—Editor]

International Trade committee  On the first point, I echo Glen's comments. Locally engaged staff are becoming more and more important in our interactions with our embassies abroad. Effective, locally engaged staff utilize the Canadian officer to get that access, and it continues to give, no matter who the officer is.

International Trade committee  The board members are a matter of public record, so we can have that list provided to the committee by the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. There are 15 business people from across the country with a broad representation from coast to coast, and there is a sector focus to ensure that there is a balance between manufactured goods sectors, physical goods, and professional services.

International Trade committee  I'm always in favour of having a mechanism that allows us to at least influence the agenda. The free trade agreements at least give us the opportunity to examine tariff and non-tariff trade barriers and market access issues and to establish a dispute resolution mechanism. Without a bilateral agreement, we have no chance.

International Trade committee  We talk about the global footprint, but I think one of the things we have to recognize is that along with the global footprint is a footprint of regional offices across Canada, which are now a part of the Trade Commissioner Service. These local offices are very important to communicating with the great city of London, in your constituency.

International Trade committee  Let me start with whether our footprint is adequate. We're talking about constrained resources within the public sector. We're talking about resource reallocations, budgets being under pressure, so we need to look at doing more with less. We need to look at whether we need to have fully staffed Canadian positions in certain countries in West Africa.

International Trade committee  There is no way to allow SMEs to access a level playing field without taking an influence or a control position on our bilateral relations, so I can say unequivocally that free trade agreements will create economic advantage for SMEs. The commercialization framework comment was that we cannot put it into a box.

International Trade committee  I certainly could give you a perspective. In our company, our whole founding, as with many SMEs today, was on a basis of origin-based processing. When we look at the creation of value in our sector and in many other sectors, we're really looking at how we differentiate our products to take them higher up the value chain and create wealth and jobs and opportunity here.

International Trade committee  Thank you very much for tying me in from Regina today. To start off, Mr. Chair, what I would like to do is give a little bit of a background to committee members on my background and my perspective on what I'd like to talk about today. I am sitting here as the chair of the SME advisory council for the international trade minister and the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade.