In answer to the first part of your question, our organization, as I mentioned, regroups over 4,000 motor carriers, large and small. In Canada, about 90% of trucking companies have fewer than five trucks. It is predominantly an industry made up of small companies. There are the big companies, obviously, that you see on the highway, and you know who they are nationally as well as provincially.
I would say that in terms of the hardships the industry is facing, it's evenly spread. There is an old expression, “the bigger they are, the harder they fall”, and we've seen that in the past. I don't think there's any particular disadvantage to smaller companies, other than the fact that perhaps, in an extended period of downturn, they may not have the deep pockets that some of the larger companies have and the access to capital to keep them going and so forth.
However, we found many of these smaller companies have been able to find niche markets because, by virtue of their smaller size, they are perhaps able to be a little quicker on their feet, if I can use that term. For example, you'll find some smaller companies in this area along the St. Lawrence that will have four or five trucks and will specialize only in cross-border transportation. They may employ, as a result of that, a higher proportion of aboriginal Canadians than you would see in other companies because those aboriginal Canadians have more flexibility in terms of operating in the U.S.
The question of business failures, bankruptcies, mergers is always there. As I mentioned in my comments, in the current situation where we have excess capacity and what's colloquially being called too many trucks chasing too little freight, the expectation would be that perhaps there might be some rationalization. Whether that is a large company buying a small company or a small company going out of business, those kinds of risks always exist in terms of this kind of economy.
At this point, I don't perceive an undue risk for the smaller companies. As I mentioned, depending on the region and the size of the association, we will have a large number of smaller companies as our members, some with one, two, and three trucks. We try to look after their interests as well.