I couldn't agree more that maintaining our economic competitiveness and access to the U.S. market is vital for Canada's economic prosperity. To that end and perhaps unsurprisingly, the chamber doesn't support protectionist measures between Canada and the U.S., our largest trading partner, since such policies could have significant unintended consequences.
With respect to critical minerals and Canada's strategy in this space, I mentioned during my opening remarks that we should explore some sort of strategic stockpiling, similar to what the U.S. has, to get a petroleum preserve that can support Canada weathering any type of short-term supply disruption in this space. But more broadly, in order to ensure that collaboration between Canada and the U.S. continues, we have to work on areas of agreement. A joint action plan on critical minerals between Canada and the U.S. was signed about two years ago, and it is the chamber's view that under this agreement Canada has significant opportunities to be a major continental player in supplying minerals for clean-tech energy supply chain resiliency and digital components vital for cybersecurity. We need to work with our allies in this space, and part of the calculus here is ensuring that vital trade corridors remain open and that there's trust amongst our closest trading partners.