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 pursuing trade and see themselves as a producing and trading nation and, as many of you have said, it appears that multilateral agreements are currently not on the horizon, then bilateral agreements are the way to go. So Canada is an obvious target and area of interest to them.