International Trade Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2018

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Good morning, everyone, on this cold November Ottawa day. I hope nobody had too many problems getting here. Welcome. We're continuing our study dealing with the opportunities from our international trade agreements and how we can help small and medium-sized enterprises. We have with us five stakeholders.

Some of you have been here before but if not, we're going to give you guys the floor first. Try to do it in around five minutes each—that would be preferable—and then we'll open up the dialogue with the MPs. Without further ado, we're going to start off with the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Ontario.

Ms. Bamford, go ahead. You have the floor.

[Jocelyn Bamford, Vice-President of Automatic Coating Limited, and Founder, Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Ontario]

Thank you for inviting me to speak today.

I'm not a lobbyist. I'm a business owner. We have a small company in Scarborough. It was started off by my father-in-law as a washing machine repair company, and it's grown to 92 people. We have over four patents for new technology developed here in Canada and we hope to export worldwide.

Ninety-two per cent of all companies in Canada are 100 people and below. I want to reiterate that. It's a big difference between small business and large business, and a lot different from the United States, which tends to have a gradual increase in business size. We have a lot of small companies, and then we have large companies.

Small and medium-sized companies are the lifeblood of the economy. We pay for everything. Without us, there are no schools, no hospitals and probably no politicians as well. We have to keep that in mind. What we do is put money into the economy. We give people jobs so they can pay taxes.

If you want to know what you can do to help businesses, the best thing you can do is to go back to your ridings and talk to those businesses. Don't make them come to you. Go to them, because we're just trying to survive. We're trying to keep the lights on and people paid.

You've asked me here to give you my advice on how to help business. Here's what we need. First of all, and most importantly, we need to be able to compete. We're not competitive in Canada due to the fact that our energy pricing is not competitive. I pay three times what I would pay for electricity if I moved my business to the United States. I also have to deal with cap and trade and carbon pricing. That adds costs that make it impossible for me to compete worldwide.

You can negotiate all the trade deals you like, but if we're not competitive, we're not going to be able to compete with those trade deals, and it will just be a vehicle for other countries dumping their product into ours.

There is also the tariff situation. Right now, there's talk of tariff waivers for LNG. We supply to the oil and gas industry. That will prevent fabricators, coders and steel companies from working on projects that are Canadian. We think that's fundamentally unfair.

The tariff situation is very inconsistent. One of our members makes screws and bolts. He tries to source as many Canadian products as he can, but there's one product that he can only source in the United States. He pays a tariff on that, and then he has to charge more to his Canadian customers who pick up that specific nut and bolt. He has a very innovative nut and bolt. Probably people think that's boring, but those nuts and bolts last a lot longer than anyone else's nuts and bolts. He has to charge more to his Canadian company. When he exports them to U.S. companies, he does get a tariff waiver, but those U.S. companies end up selling back to the Canadian companies for less than what he could sell to the Canadian companies. We think that's unfair.

We need assistance in exporting our innovation. We need ways to take small and medium-sized businesses that have great innovation and technology and pair them up with larger companies that have footprints to get our products to market. That would be a very helpful way to get our products to market.

We need equity and fairness. About six weeks ago, I saw the economic strategy tables. I was horrified, because when you read those economic strategy tables, it doesn't say we're going to create a level playing field where people can rise or fail on their own innovation. It says, we're going to pick the winners and losers. We're not going to help everybody. We're going to decide who's going to succeed and who will fail. We think, for a government that talks about equity and fairness, that is fundamentally not fair and not equitable.

We are also concerned about the strategic innovation fund. Again, we want everyone to be able to succeed and fail on their own merit, and not have government pick the winners and losers.

We need pipelines built so that we can have affordable energy and be able to sell our products. We're concerned about C-69 because we believe it will make us less competitive.

We need the trade commissioners to be more effective. They don't need to be diplomats. They need to be salespeople. For four years, I've been trying to get one of my patented products, which could be utilized by navies around the world, to Australia. I have yet to get an appointment with the Australian navy through our trade commissioners. We need our trade commissioners to help us set up appointments so that we can get in and show them our technology, which is world class.

I'm concerned that if we don't do some things to make us more competitive, then companies will leave. We've seen companies leave or take their growth and move it outside to the United States, so our wonderful success and innovation in Canada will be another country's success story. We think that's going to be a tragedy.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you and good timing. You're right on and you didn't even read from notes.

[Jocelyn Bamford]

I don't. I spoke from my heart.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

That's the way we want to hear it.

Thank you for your presentation.

We're going to move over to the Business Council of Canada, who's not a stranger to coming in front of us. Thank you for coming again.

Go ahead, sir. You have the floor.

[Brian Kingston, Vice-President, Policy, International and Fiscal Issues, Business Council of Canada]

Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members. Thanks for the invitation to take part in your study on connecting SMEs to new markets.

The Business Council of Canada, as you know, represents chief executives and entrepreneurs from 150 leading Canadian companies, from all sectors and regions of the country. Our member companies employ 1.7 million Canadians, which accounts for more than half the value of the TSX, contribute the largest share of federal corporate taxes and are responsible for most of Canada's exports, philanthropy and private sector investments in R and D.

Canadians rely on international trade to prosper. The trade of goods and services now represents 64% of our gross domestic product and, according to Global Affairs Canada, one in five jobs can be directly linked to exports. Recognizing the importance of trade to the Canadian economy, successive governments have negotiated free trade agreements to enable companies to access these new markets around the world. Put simply, trade agreements create a level playing field for companies to compete in foreign markets. They open markets to Canadian businesses of all sizes, not just large companies, by reducing trade barriers, such as tariffs, quotas and non-tariff barriers, and they create more predictable, fair and transparent conditions for businesses operating abroad.

Canada now has an impressive suite of trade agreements available for businesses to use. We have 14 trade agreement in force and, of course, with the CPTPP, the comprehensive and progressive trans-Pacific partnership agreement, we will have free trade with over 60% of the global economy. This gives Canadian companies preferential access to over 90% of existing export markets and it uniquely positions Canada as the only G7 nation with free trade access to the U.S., the Americas and the Asia-Pacific region, including three of the world's four largest economies. We're truly in an enviable position, when it comes to our free trade access around the world.

Unfortunately, though, few small and medium-sized businesses have the capacity and resources to be first movers into international markets and most often, we witness big businesses leading the way. In fact, large enterprises represent only 2.6% of all exporting enterprises in Canada, yet they're responsible for over 60% of our total exports. Therefore, if Canada is to improve its trade performance, we need to change that ratio and help SMEs trade more and be responsible for a bigger share of Canada's exports.

Research we've done shows that Canadian SME exporters generally have better chances of surviving in emerging markets, if they're older when they enter, export to an advanced economy first, introduce new products more often and have access to financing and more export destinations.

We also find that technology-enabled SMEs that sell through online platforms are much more likely to export and to reach foreign markets than traditional large multinationals, although of course, their sales will be significantly smaller.

We believe that Canada's trade commissioner service does an admirable job of promoting Canadian exports abroad and supporting SMEs going global. We would like to congratulate the government for yesterday's announcement in the fall economic statement of an export diversification strategy that included $184 million, over five years, in new funding for the trade commissioner service. We think this is long overdue. Our trade commissioner service, when compared with other similar agencies in other countries around the world, is underfunded. We think this is a very valuable investment that will pay off, not just for SMEs but for large companies as well that use the trade commissioner service.

One area where we think there is some room for improvement is to see some better coordination between Export Development Canada, which is responsible for export financing, of course, and the Business Development Bank of Canada, which is responsible for supporting small and medium-sized businesses with the trade commissioner service. EDC and BDC service offerings, in support of going global, should be complementary and include a direct link to services offered by the TCS. There has been progress made on this in recent years, but there's still no explicit protocol between EDC, BDC and the trade commissioner service to make sure that Canadian exporters, SMEs in particular, are aware of the full suite of services that the government provides. It could be a single window or simply a protocol to ensure that there's better communication and coordination among those agencies, so that SMEs and large companies see the suite of services and are able to access them all at the same time.

Canada's impressive suite of free trade agreements, including CETA and CPTPP, will be more beneficial to Canadians, if there is broader awareness of the deals and tailor-made services available for exporters to take advantage of the market access negotiated.

With that I conclude my remarks. Thank you for the opportunity.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, Mr. Kingston.

We'll go now to the Canada China Business Council. We have the president with us.

Mr. Shantz, you have the floor.

[Graham Shantz, President, Canada China Business Council]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Chair, vice-chairs, committee members, I'm Graham Shantz, president of the Canada China Business Council, or CCBC.

This year is our 40th anniversary as a national non-profit organization that's been dedicated to doing more and better business for our 350-plus members with China. Our members represent all sectors of the Canadian economy from coast to coast to coast. We have six offices today, four in Canada and two in China. We've just announced that we're going to open a fifth office in Canada—in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Mr. Chair—which will give us an ability to do what we've done for a long time, which is to support Canadian companies in their China strategies. Those offices largely support SMEs.

Since we started in 1978, China's economic reforms have driven China's rapid growth. Our larger members have obviously benefited from that growth. On the export side, think of China's emergence as a major, or “the” major importer for Canadian exporters of pulp, coal, grains and oilseeds. Our large insurance and banking members have established a substantial presence in China. Our pension fund members have been expanding their investments and their China footprints. One last very important point is that our large members from our beginning 40 years ago have viewed membership in the Canada China Business Council in part as a public good to assist other Canadians companies, SMEs in particular, to figure out how to do business with China.

Recently China's rapid economic growth has led to a fundamental change in what it's meant for Canadian companies—specifically, the emergence of China's new elite wealthy. These are the new consumers who've discovered our east coast seafood, who are touring Quebec, who've invested in our Ontario and B.C. wine industries, and whose children study in Alberta's universities and colleges. There are Chinese private equity firms that are taking stakes in small start-ups in my hometown of Waterloo, Ontario, in the IT sector. Chinese tourists are visiting Canada's north.

I should also emphasize that our membership is about 70% SMEs. About 20% of our total membership is made up of educational institutions here in Canada. A significant number of our SMEs are also tourism-related. I believe this point is fundamental for your work as a committee. We often talk about exports, but the impact of China's growth for Canadian SMEs is fundamentally a domestic story as well in the area of education, and tourism in particular. There are some things that can be done to make sure that, on the tourism side specifically, Canadian SMEs are ready to take advantage of the world's largest outbound tourism market, which is the Chinese market. My understanding is that tourism represents roughly 2% of Canada's GDP. When I was in government, serving as our ambassador in Spain, it was 9% of GDP in Spain.

My point there is twofold. One, we can do better in terms of tapping into the China market, which is the largest outbound market, in support of our SMEs. The other thing is that we should be targeted in what we do to help Canadian SMEs benefit from tourism in general, and obviously with this role from the China side in particular.

On the more classic issue of SMEs in China, every couple of years we poll our 350 members. The vast majority of those members, as I mentioned, are SMEs. I'll highlight briefly what their experiences are in China and what they're looking for in terms of support.

The membership has consistently identified several high-priority issues for their China businesses. Finding a reliable local partner is a challenge, one of the keys to success and one of their major challenges in trying to get into the China market. The SMEs have noted that staying current with national and local regulations in China is fundamental to their success. In addition, understanding the different business culture, and the culture in general, is critical. There's been a lot of media attention put onto intellectual property protection. Without understating those challenges, it's worth noting that IP protection has fallen lower on the list of challenges for our membership broadly and the SMEs as well.

In these opening remarks, I'd also like to highlight what the CCBC is doing to help our SME members. We operate two incubation centres, as we call them, one in our Beijing office and one in our Shanghai office. We've rolled out SME training coast to coast in each of the last two years. This is in five cities in Canada. We're developing, internally, training modules for SMEs, which will cover a whole range of issues to try to address what SMEs' concerns are with respect to establishing in China.

The China market is hyper-competitive and it's cost sensitive. We're doing work in China through our two offices there promoting Canada as a destination for investment in secondary and tertiary cities in China.

Should committee members want to explore any of those topics I'm happy to do so in the Q and A section.

Finally, to the committee, on November 12 our board recently launched an initiative to look at what we as a business council can do to assist Canadian SMEs that are owned and run by women, first nations or young Canadian entrepreneurs in their China-related efforts. We're in the consultation phase of that effort and any views that you have or the work of your committee will be quite interesting to us as you continue with your work.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you.

Those are very impressive numbers on the activity between the two countries.

I would never have thought that 70% are SMEs. That's good stuff.

[Graham Shantz]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

We're going to move over to the Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters.

We have Mr. Wilson, who is another local continuing attendant at our meetings.

It's good to see you again, sir.

You have the floor.

[Mathew Wilson, Senior Vice-President, Policy and Government Relations, Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters]

Thank you for having me. Thank you, all members, for inviting us back again.

I'm here today on behalf of Canada's manufacturing and exporting industries and our association's 2,500 direct members to talk about how we can get small and medium-sized enterprise to export more and take advantage of recently signed trade deals.

The CME represents the largest business sector in the country. Manufacturing directly accounts for 11% of GDP, two-thirds of Canada's exports and 1.7 million employees in high wage, high-skilled jobs in nearly every community across the country. Whereas we represent some of Canada's largest companies, the vast majority of our members from coast to coast are SMEs.

First, we want to take the time to applaud the committee for taking the time to study this crucial issue. It's a critical issue for the growth of the manufacturing sector and the prosperity of the country as a whole. In 2016, the CME called for the federal government to support a plan that would double manufacturing output and exports by 2030 as part of our “Industrie 2030” strategy. Over the past several years the government has implemented many elements of our plan.

However, the focus on exports has not been as sharp as the focus on innovation. As a follow-up to that initial strategy, CME recently published a paper called “Stalled Trade: Gearing up Canada's Exports”, which focused on the issues that this committee is targeting in your current study. I brought a copy today and entered it into the record. I will outline several of our findings and recommendations for action with the remainder of my remarks.

In 2017, Canada reached an all-time record high for both total goods exports and manufactured goods exports, with $550 billion and $360 billion in exports respectively. However, since 2000, really since China entered the WTO, Canada's export performance has been near the bottom in the world. Average annual export growth has been about 2.5%. However, once you remove crude oil exports, Canada's export performance has been at or below inflation for almost 20 straight years. Meanwhile, global trade has expanded at a rate of over 6% a year. Our closest competitors are expanding much closer to global averages. U.S. export growth has been 4% annually and Germany is nearly at 6%.

Since 2000, actually only Japan has had a worse export performance across the G7. This is despite signing FTAs with most major markets around the world. Clearly we need a different approach besides just signing free trade agreements.

The government took a huge step in the right direction yesterday with the fall economic statement. The $1.1-billion investment in an export diversification strategy with the stated goal to increase exports by 50% by 2025 is a bold and welcome initiative. It aligns directly with the CME's stated goals.

How do we meet this target?

Based on our detailed research and consultation with members we believe our resources should be focused on three core pillars.

First, Canada must strengthen its export foundation with a focus on building within existing free trade agreements, especially within North America. Expecting companies that have never exported to begin exporting to countries with different cultural, legal and business norms is expecting way too much. A better approach is to get more companies to take advantage of what is more readily available in our neighbourhood. Very few companies are doing that today.

Second, companies can't export if they don't have capacity and aren't globally competitive, which most manufacturers today are not. We need to address Canada's investment climate to attract more global production mandates from large multinational companies and then connect SMEs into those supply chains. The measures taken yesterday in the fall economic statement on immediate ACCA, along with a promise to address regulatory barriers, are welcome steps in this regard but only first steps.

Third, and most importantly for this study and for the CME, we must scale up SMEs by developing stronger support programs to encourage domestic investment and expand international growth opportunities. Let me expand on this point.

Over 95% of Canadian manufacturers are SMEs. Of those companies 75% have fewer than 10 employees. By comparison, in the United States roughly 55% of manufacturers have fewer than 10 employees. This is a huge structural and resource gap that undermines Canada's performance. At this size, SMEs lack scale and resources to compete globally to any meaningful degree. This is where our focus should be, filling the resource gap of companies.

As such we were very pleased to see the actions proposed yesterday in the fall economic statement focused directly on this priority. Specifically we want to emphasize the importance of new and additional funding for actions like associations to introduce export accelerator services; the expansion of the funding of the trade commissioner service and the CanExport program; the mentorship program, which is something I have spoken about directly about at this committee before; additional support for company training and hiring of outside expertise, something else we've talked about here several times; and prioritizing trade infrastructure to help get our goods to market.

All of these priority actions form the base of the CME's export strategy and we applaud the government's intention to mirror our recommendations. Now we must move beyond just words and move into implementation of these promises. This will be our focus working with the government, and it should be the focus of both this committee and the government as a whole.

I want to thank the government again for taking the steps it did yesterday, and I want to thank all of you for inviting me to speak to you here today. I look forward to a broader discussion.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, Mr. Wilson.

We're now going to go to the Saskatchewan Trade and Export Partnership. When we did our TPP study, we went right across the country. I think we were in Saskatoon and we met with your group at that time. Thank you for coming across the country to be here with us today, sir. You have the floor.

[Chris Dekker, President and Chief Executive Officer, Saskatchewan Trade and Export Partnership]

Thank you.

Thank you very much for the invitation and the opportunity to address the standing committee as you consider how the federal government can better connect small and medium enterprises with trade opportunities around the world. This is an important subject. It's important to us all.

It was said earlier today that one in five jobs in Canada depends on exports. Our research in Saskatchewan indicates that as many as one in three jobs depends on exports. The reason for that is relatively simple. We have a population of only 1.2 million people. It's growing but it's still a very small domestic market, so we have to ship and export what we produce outside of our borders in order to expand and to succeed economically.

It's for this fundamental reason that the Government of Saskatchewan, some 22 years ago, decided to move its trade promotion function away from the government bureaucracy and closer to the industry it serves. As such, Saskatchewan Trade and Export Partnership, known as STEP, is an independent and non-profit export promotion agency serving about 400 members from across the province, most of them SMEs. We have 15 directors on the board, 12 of whom represent the export industry itself. It is from this unique and highly successful model—and from this industry context—that we provide some observations the committee may want to consider.

Through the many witnesses who have been here before, on this trade matter and many others, I'm sure that you are well aware of the significant business challenges specific to the export industry—whether it's different cultures and languages, regional conflicts, tariffs and non-tariff barriers, unfamiliar legal and financial systems, fluctuating exchange rates, varying labelling and regulatory requirements, restricted export infrastructure, or expensive logistics, just to name a few. These create uncertainty for small business, and we all know that small business—any business—does not like uncertainty.

STEP is very supportive and appreciative of the federal government's efforts to improve market access through the removal and reduction of tariffs and non-tariff barriers through USMCA, CPTPP and CETA, which are critically important. Indeed, given a level playing field, our exporters can compete with anybody in the world.

It's important to note that when Canada enters into free trade agreements with other jurisdictions we're only reducing one or two of the exporter's total risks. STEP's suite of programs and services are designed to turn that remaining uncertainty into measurable risk. In addition to guidance and general counselling, STEP organizes ongoing trade missions and incoming buyer events. We do customized market intelligence services and offer market access programs that reduce the cost of marketing in new jurisdictions.

Very specifically, in support of the opportunities afforded our economy through recent free trade agreements, STEP organized nine round tables and seminars with Saskatchewan's export industry over the last year, including the one that was referenced by the chair. In addition, we published exporter guides for the South Korean, European and United States markets. More recently, in concert with CPTPP ratification, STEP participated in the creation of the Canada West Foundation's CPTPP guide for small businesses in western Canada. In the new year, STEP will partner with Global Affairs Canada to offer a CPTPP exporter seminar, and it has organized several outbound trade missions to Japan, Vietnam and Malaysia in the new year.

As you know, the federal government plays a critical role through Global Affairs Canada and the trade commissioner service, Western Economic Diversification, Export Development Canada, and the Business Development Bank. We work very closely with these federal agencies, and in fact provide and enjoy a co-office, co-location effort with Global Affairs Canada and EDC.

In addition to the ongoing support for these internationally engaged federal agencies, we would suggest two key areas of focus for the committee consider, the first being very close to home. Nationally, we believe the role of the federal government should be to help create an environment that is supportive of small and medium-sized businesses and helps SMEs to compete on the international stage through competitive taxation, fair regulation, and the construction and maintenance of export-enabling infrastructure. I would say that's most notably rail, port capacity and pipeline construction.

Internationally, the role of the federal government is to help path find for small business, continue to ensure market access, and promote and defend the Canadian brand abroad.

Thank you very much for your time and your consideration.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, sir.

Now we're going to have a dialogue with the MPs. We're going to start off with the Conservative Party.

Mr. Allison, you have the floor.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and to all our guests who are here.

We could have each of you individually for the full two hours, so I apologize that my pale five minutes is not going to get to everybody.

Let me get back on my soapbox in terms of competitiveness. I still say fundamentally that on trade deals, I think as a country we've done a decent job, our government and the Liberals. We will give them credit where credit's due. That's where it's going to stop, though.

Sorry, guys. You're not going to get any more credit than that. Take what you can get. I have to tell you from a competitiveness point of view though—and all of you touched on it—we're getting our butts kicked around the world.

I look at what we decided to do yesterday, with some half measures in an economic update, and I'm afraid I'm not nearly as optimistic as maybe some of my colleagues on the opposite side here are.

We still have issues with regulations. That was mentioned as well as access to capital, skills training, cost of energy and infrastructure spending. We haven't spent any money on infrastructure in the last three years because we're setting up a bank.

That doesn't even talk about your point, Mr. Dekker, about critical trade infrastructure, which is separate from the infrastructure we need in our communities. National debt continues to go...and then there's personal taxation. I don't know in what world or on what planet over 50% for personal taxation is actually an okay thing, where the more you work and the harder you work, the more gets drawn back.

Jocelyn, you talked about some of these competitiveness issues. By the way, I haven't even talked about tariffs yet, which is obviously right there. Why would we ever even think about signing the deal without removing tariffs?

Talk to me about the reality of some of the members on the ground. I know for a fact that businesses are moving to the States as we speak, yet this government is clueless in terms of actually realizing that this is going on.

Talk to me about real world examples of what is going on right now.

[Jocelyn Bamford]

I will just talk about some of the companies in my area that are coalition members. There's this great Indian baked goods company called Surati. If you ever want the best pistachio cookie made right here in Canada, that's the place to go. They were going to expand into a building right next door, but instead they are going to expand into the States. That's 150 jobs we could have had.

Plasticap Canada were also going to expand, and now they are expanding into Ohio. These are our jobs. As a mother, what I'm worried about, and the only reason I'm here today....

When I started the coalition, one of the other members of the coalition, a business friend, said, “What are you doing, Jocelyn? Why are you banging your head against the wall? Why don't you just go out and worry about your business and try to make money off the cap and trade and green energy?” I said, “If I did that, my kids wouldn't have anywhere to work.”

All of us, all of you guys, should be worried about our uncompetitive nature, because you guys have kids and you want them to work.

We need to get a strategy that helps us compete, and we need to forget about the partisanship. We need to get going on how we make it more effective and more competitive.

Those are two companies. Those are 300 jobs that we could have had here in Canada. Those are great products, and guess what's going to happen once they go down there. They don't treat you like a criminal if you are a Canadian company. What did I hear? We were tax cheats. I used to hear from the former premier of Ontario that we were bad actors. We're not bad actors. We're not tax cheats. We look after our employees. We take care of them when they are sick. We need help on growth and competitiveness so we can expand.

I will tell you one other story. I was talking to one of my members who's at capacity now, and his customers are asking him to expand. That's a risky proposition. I said, “Are you going to expand?” He said, “Why am I going to do that? I will just end up giving more money back to the government.”

That's what you're up against. You want people to grow and expand and make money, but when they can, they don't grow to their capacity. Fundamentally you have to ask yourself. I as a business owner work 14 hours a day. I was up last night putting a proposal together for a customer while I was driving here. We're not drinking champagne from our shoes. We're working to keep the lights on. How many of my 14-hour days should I work for me, and how many should I work for you? Because right now I'm working more for you than I am for me, and that's not a good thing.

We need to get competitive. We need to celebrate success. We need to help companies scale up, and we need to make it beneficial for them to do so, because otherwise why are they killing themselves?

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Thank you.

I don't have much time left, so I will just maybe make a comment.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

You have about 20 seconds.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

I know they're going to lobby for over $600 million for media, and that's a great thing, and there is $800 million for SIF, which, by the way, SMEs are still not going to have access to. At the end of the day, there were a lot of half measures in this economic update, and nothing for SMEs, which is who we need to help.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

We'll go over to the Liberals now. Mr. Dhaliwal, you have the floor.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I was listening to the conversations we had and I'm going to start with Saskatchewan. The committee travelled across Canada when we were studying the CPTPP agreement. Every person we came across in Saskatchewan and Manitoba is all for free trade and says free trade helps. Are all the businesses in Saskatchewan that do foreign trade big, or are there small and medium-sized ones as well?

[Chris Dekker]

For certain, there are small and medium-sized as well as large players in the international agricultural commodity fields. Members of STEP include, for instance, Nutrien, Viterra and AGT Foods, but the vast majority of our members are small and medium-sized enterprises. In fact, 76% of our member businesses have between one and 50 jobs.

Certainly the vast majority of exports from Saskatchewan in the agricultural commodity field are from the large enterprises, but there are a number of brokers and small producers, and indeed farmers, who are getting directly involved in exporting their goods to markets around the world.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

As Mr. Wilson mentioned about the economic statement the government gave yesterday, we are going to invest $10 million over the $100 million that we already invest in small and medium-sized businesses so that they can do well. How do you see that farmers, these small businesses from Saskatchewan and from western Canada in general, can take advantage of this?

[Chris Dekker]

As mentioned in my opening comments, there is a whole suite of risks for exporters as they produce their goods and ship them around the world. The tariffs and the reduction of tariffs and non-tariff barriers are only one element of the reason they're not successful or are reluctant to export around the world. There are a number of initiatives that trade promotion agencies such as STEP do to help reduce the risk and make sure they are aware of the opportunities afforded to them, either through the federal and provincial governments or trade associations. We path find for that and make that pathway to exports easier for them, reducing their risk.

I'm not sure of the details of the entire package that was announced yesterday. That's something we're going to have to read through and see how we can specifically assist small and medium-sized enterprises in taking full advantage of that. Any increased focus and access, as well as resources to the export industry, would be welcome.