Thank you.
Evidence of meeting #140 for International Trade in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was businesses.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #140 for International Trade in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was businesses.
A recording is available from Parliament.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
3:55 p.m.
Vice-President, Business Services, Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal
Actually, to my knowledge, Canada is the only G7 country to have concluded an agreement with all the other G7 countries. I agree with Ms. Chee. What works best isn't necessarily when government employees come to talk to us about agreements, but rather when entrepreneurs come to talk about their experience and a government-backed market.
Last week, we held an activity on the new Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. Usually, this type of event would draw about 50 people. This time, 130 people came to hear from businesses who talked about how they could benefit from the agreement. The Canadian ambassador to Japan, who happened to be in town, came to talk about the fact that our businesses had an advantage over American companies. In fact, Japan doesn't yet have any agreements with the United States.
So what works well is testimony from businesspeople, hearing peers from other businesses come to discuss their experience, with the support of government people, of course.
3:55 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
We don't have much time, but Ms. Altner, if you have a quick answer, we could take it.
4 p.m.
Chair, Women's Enterprise Organizations of Canada
Yes, I have a very quick two-part answer.
First, our desire to be involved in the development of trade agreements is considerable, given what has worked so well in the U.S., which is that those businesses doing business with government are mandated to diversify their supply stream. We would like to see something like that happening in Canada: that as part of all the trade agreements that are developed, there is a surety that women entrepreneurs will be included so that we can achieve some degree of parity.
Second, of course, in terms of governance, is measuring outcomes of the trade agreements to ensure there is gender-disaggregated data to measure the efficacy of the programs and the parity of contract awards over time, so that we can see what progress is being made in this area.
4 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
Thank you very much. We're going to the last MP today.
Madam Ludwig, you have five minutes. You're sharing your time with Mr. Peterson.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Yes, thank you, Chair. I'm giving my first minute to Mr. Peterson.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Thank you. I appreciate that, Madam Ludwig.
Being from York Region, I wanted to make sure that I got a chance to ask Melissa a question.
Welcome, Melissa. I'm happy to see you here. Maybe you can elaborate for everybody here on the ecosystem that now exists in York Region and how that's growing in the innovation and tech fields, and on what lessons can be learned from that in other parts across the country when companies like yours want to tap into international markets. Give us a 30-second commercial on the great work we're doing in York Region.
4 p.m.
President and Chief Executive Officer, ventureLAB
Thank you, Kyle. I appreciate it.
York Region is a thriving community. As I said, it's a community of 1.2 million and growing. There are more than 600,000 jobs created. It is the jewel, I think, in the Ontario ecosystem as part of a larger innovation ecosystem. We have companies that are global multinationals, such as AMD, IBM's headquarters and Global Software Lab. We also have all of these thriving SMEs and start-ups.
One of the things that is quite unique to York Region, particularly centred around Markham, is that Markham is I think the most diverse city in Canada; it is I think over 78% foreign-born in terms of the community. In terms of what that allows us to do, it's the world at our feet inside our community. All of these diverse cultures and all of these diverse methods of thinking get layered into the businesses that are scaling in the community.
Another unique attribute, I think, in terms of the entrepreneurs who are growing and scaling is that they actually came from a lot of these global multinationals. They are very seasoned entrepreneurs who already have done this, so they have a much higher probability of success. One of the two I referenced actually did come out of ATI.
I think there's a real thriving kind of community, and government programs like the supercluster, FedDev and the other opportunities that we are a part of in our ecosystem allow us to cross the country to share our learning.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Kyle Peterson Liberal Newmarket—Aurora, ON
Thank you for that.
Ms. Ludwig now has a few questions, I believe.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
Thanks to all of you for your presentations today.
My first question is for you, Mr. Jobin.
Specifically, you offered us information on your workshops. Do the members from the chamber pay a fee for the workshops?
4 p.m.
Vice-President, Business Services, Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal
Yes, they do.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
How long are the workshops? You have six to eight weeks, but is the format weekends or...?
4 p.m.
Vice-President, Business Services, Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal
No. That program, TAP, is six to eight weeks long, but the workshops are for three hours. They're basically half-day seminars. Sometimes there's a networking lunch afterward, but usually they're half-day seminars. That's what the companies like. They don't like it if they're too long, because time is money, basically.
4 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
The extent of the study, the overall objective, is really to better connect small businesses with trade. Certainly, as consecutive governments have signed 14 trade agreements with 51 countries, we're trying to increase the awareness of services in terms of diversification. That's exactly what you're doing. I'm wondering how we take some of the work that you're doing in your area and expand that across the country. Could you tell us a bit about the diversification training that you're working on?
4 p.m.
Vice-President, Business Services, Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal
Yes, we work also.... When I'm talking about the chamber of commerce, the chamber of commerce has the World Trade Center Montréal inside the organization, as do other provinces. You have the World Trade Center Toronto and you have it in Winnipeg, Halifax and Vancouver.
They're all very active. We all talk to each other all the time. TAP, which I was talking about, is a program that started in Toronto and expanded throughout Canada. In Vancouver, it's exactly the same model. World Trade Center Vancouver is inside the board of trade. It's the same thing in Toronto. In Winnipeg, it's a little different. The licence belongs to the chamber and they work together, but they're not embedded completely, like they are here or in Toronto or Vancouver.
4:05 p.m.
Liberal
Karen Ludwig Liberal New Brunswick Southwest, NB
I have one last question for you. The business people that have gone through your workshops, do you track their success in export beyond the first or second year? Do they return for the diversification workshops?
4:05 p.m.
Vice-President, Business Services, Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal
It's a challenge that we all have. We do try to track them. When they come on the trade missions with us, if we spend, say, five days with them, we develop a better relationship. If they come for three hours and then we call them six months later, it doesn't work as much. An awareness seminar on, for example, how to do business in Japan is a good way for us to raise interest in the market and then to develop a trade mission. Developing a trade mission takes a lot of money, a lot of time for us. We want to make sure that we tell them about the market first and then a year later maybe we'll do a trade mission. That's basically how we work.
4:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Mark Eyking
Thanks, Ms. Ludwig.
That wraps up questioning from the MPs, and that wraps up the presentations from witnesses. We had eight good meetings. We had over 30 witnesses from right across the country from different sectors and different groups and chambers of commerce. We had some very good witnesses and presentations.
Just to let the witnesses with us today know, when we finish our report—it will take us a few weeks to pull it together—your recommendations will be in there along with many others, including some of the actions we can push forward for the government to help small and medium-sized businesses across this country.
Thank you for joining us today. We will issue a report, in which you will find some good submissions from other organizations that presented to us.
Thank you. You did a great job.
The meeting is adjourned.