Every entrepreneur who's used our trade commissioner services says they're our best kept secret as a nation. They're super-useful at a certain stage, generally when they're a lot bigger than they need to be. It's disproportionately white guys who are leveraging those services. The feedback we're getting is that they're great for the manufacturing sector, for pharmaceuticals, for resource-based sectors, but they're not doing what they could be doing for our ideas economy, our innovation economy, and this is where the world is going.
I think we need to reboot our trade commissioner services to make sure they're serving women and every entrepreneur. We have to realize that our businesses in Canada are small, and they can scale very fast. There is an opportunity in the mid-stage to equip our trade commissioner services with what they need to connect our digital economy.
Other countries like Israel and Switzerland are very good at making these connections. I think it comes down to information and equipping the trade commissioners with the insights they need. Startup Canada would be happy to be of service. We work with our global counterparts in the trade commissioner services quite a lot. There's a lot of work to be done in that area.
I would say as well, in response to previous comments, that we work with the start-up nations. We're part of a network of 50 nations across the world. Canada, we're a non-profit, but the other members are all the other governments in the world. Canada needs to move faster when it comes to opening it up.
We keep hearing a lot about protectionism, which is very important for our culture, but why not unleash an entrepreneurial culture in Canada and work in that way? Our entrepreneurs are choosing jurisdictions that are more competitive and more open. We should be moving towards being more open and competitive.