Sure. We have had commitments with respect to state-owned enterprises in our agreements since the WTO, so that's for over 20 years.
Those obligations have done a few things. They have required a certain amount of transparency and openness with respect to how those enterprises are run, and they have put rules around the kind of government support that can be given to state trading enterprises. Also, they have required those enterprises, when they are competing in the commercial environment, to compete on commercial terms. If you're going to compete with commercial companies, you must behave as a commercial company. That's essentially the idea.
In the TPP, we took that further and put rules around the kinds of government support or subsidies that can be given to these entities, not only when they trade in goods but also when they trade in the services environment, because there is a growing recognition that services trade is in fact some of the most important trade, especially in Canada, that our enterprises are in and are heading towards in the future. We expanded the rules around competition law, if you will.
These are all rules we have in Canada, right? All of these rules that we've put in the TPP are rules that our state-owned enterprises have to play by. All of our crown corporations have to play by these rules already. We have put them in the TPP in an effort to have other countries also have a similar standard.