Thank you, Chair.
I'll be very brief. I'm particularly interested in hearing the questions and discussion with the members present.
Let me very briefly bring to your attention and highlight what many of you know--that is, the state of the world economy, the state of the Canadian economy in the international context, some of the risks, as well as the opportunities--and then perhaps we can turn to questions later on.
I'd just remind members that the world economy as a whole is doing extremely well at the present time. In fact, we're in the fourth year of very strong worldwide economic growth of between 4% and 4.5%. This includes not only this country and the United States, on our own continent, but the recovery has spread both to Japan for the first time in a decade and to parts of Europe, although some member states of the European Union aren't doing as well as others. Russia has recovered spectacularly in the last five years or so, as well as, of course, Asia, which my colleague has mentioned, not only China and India, but many of the other countries of Asia. And Africa has had for the past two or three years really quite spectacular growth. So overall the world economy is doing well, notwithstanding very high energy prices, as we all know, notwithstanding the natural disasters of the last couple of years.
I think that should be, if I may suggest, the context in which we think of the performance and the prospects for the Canadian economy. We have a fairly benevolent world economy at the present time. There's strong demand, low inflation, and fairly stable financial markets. It's not bad overall with these risks, which we can talk about.
Secondly, the Canadian economy--which of course has been reported on by the Minister of Finance over the past week--within the context of the world economy is one of the star performers, mainly because of very strong worldwide growth. When the world grows, Canada grows. It has regional impacts and sectoral impacts. In particular, at the moment it is having a major impact on the value of our currency relative to other currencies. Perhaps you'll want to speak to that a bit later on.
But in fact the Canadian economy is fairly robust, with double-digit trade numbers and increasingly strong investment numbers, both in and particularly out. It's a strong economy overall, recognizing the very serious problems in certain communities in the country and certain sectors of the economy. Like anything else, for economists there are things on the one hand and on the other, and of course we can't agree on whether things are good or whether things are bad.
Finally, as to the risks, just to point this out, both for the world economy and our own, one is, of course, the pressures on energy prices and on inflation, something that most of us have forgotten about since the nasty 1980s, but inflation can in fact return, and there are signs that it is returning. There are tightening fiscal conditions, such as higher interest rates; the state of the United States consumer, which we can talk about if you wish; the global imbalances, the evil twins, particularly in the United States, of both fiscal deficit as well as trade and investment problems; and other risks to the prospects of the world economy, particularly the risk of a world-wide influenza outbreak, and in fact the thickening of borders because of security.
I think that's a brief overview that might give us a chance to carry on later, if there are further economic questions you want to raise.
Thank you.