International Trade Committee on Nov. 8th, 2017

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you.

Ms. Jorge, my mother was born on December 7; I won't say what year either.

I mentioned exploring the role of SMEs. I think roughly speaking about 90% of Canadian business is conducted through small and medium-sized enterprises and I think we also know that a very small fraction of those companies are able to actually engage in international trade. Do you have any advice or suggestions, or points, just for how we can assist small and medium-sized enterprises in Canada to better access trade opportunities in Portugal?

[Michelle Jorge]

As Mr. Fonseca was suggesting, it would be trade missions and opportunities for the network to develop with these types of conferences and missions connecting back and forth. I can tell you, from our experience with the Portuguese government, that they're absolutely receptive to having more engagement and more connections with Canada. All that really needs to happen to get that going, I think, are more face-to-face meetings and more travel back and forth. If you can support that, I think we will see in the years to come significant advancements.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Moving to language, we often think of these business opportunities in terms of the raw business, but you commented on the need to understand the culture, and a big part of that is language.

Do you think there's a role for governments, federal and provincial here in Canada, to bolster Canadians' ability to increase our literacy in languages to best take advantage of the opportunities in CETA?

[Michelle Jorge]

Absolutely. Knowing more languages means you understand the world in a better way, in my humble opinion. However, I must say that as much as I would like Portuguese to be spoken throughout the world, given my heritage, in reality, the majority of the people you'd be dealing with already speak English. In Portugal you start learning English from grade 5 onwards. Communication, as far as being able to speak—

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

It's not a big issue in Portugal.

Mr. Beck, you mentioned environmental technology. We hear a lot about the billions of dollars that stand to be made as we move towards a more sustainable energy future. I know that Germany is considered a global leader in many technologies. Do you see opportunities for Canadian business or increased trade in the area of environmental technology?

[Thomas Beck]

Absolutely. Again, we've just prepared our trade fair application for WindEnergy Hamburg, which is Germany's biggest wind energy trade fair, where they expect some 20 to 30 Canadian companies to display their products and technologies.

I think we have very strong Canadian-German partnership and co-operation in a lot of fields. We are getting, I would say, between five and seven business delegations from Germany in different areas, such as solar energy and wind energy. We have biomass and a couple of other things. It's a strong way to co-operate for both countries.

There are also other ways for our governments to co-operate. Research institutes co-operate between Germany and Canada. There's so much co-operation going on and so many opportunities. I think we'll see the results pretty soon, and with other European countries, which is fantastic. Canada has something to offer in this respect. That's a good way to start in Germany, or in France or Portugal or wherever you want.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, sir.

We're going to move over to the Liberals now. Mr. Dhaliwal, you have the floor.

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

Thank you to the presenters.

Mr. Beck, you mentioned that people from Germany face challenges in the legal field. Is there any other field where they find those challenges? How will CETA be able to improve those difficulties they face in having trade with Canada?

[Thomas Beck]

Again, the technical standards are one thing I mentioned. That will go on for some time, I think. There are legal issues and tax issues. These are things they don't understand. Let's say they come from a German background. They have a totally different legal system in Germany versus the Canadian, which is more like the English. They also have problems in understanding the different business mentalities. It's a large country. Where do I start? Do I start in Toronto? Do I start in Montreal to find business partners? It takes them a while to put the right resources here, or to understand the immigration system, when we have one specialist. These are all things where we offer consultant work for our companies, and it's very well taken. These are, in my opinion, the biggest problems companies have.

They know there are partners here in Canada to whom they can sell their products. That's not the problem. They have to change their products to the Canadian standard and those kinds of things. That's all work. Again, the legal issues, the immigration issues, and the tax issues are completely new things for them.

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

Thank you.

Ms. Jorge, Portuguese people have always been free traders. I remember when I was in school in India, they used to teach us about Vasco da Gama, who came to India to trade.

You mentioned one challenge that you did not face but many others face. I was one of those who came to Canada with engineering qualifications. I had to go to university to improve mine. Both my daughters did their medicine in Europe. They came back to Canada and they faced problems in Canada. However, in the U.S., there were no problems. In the U.S. top universities, they were all good, and now all of a sudden in Canada, every university wanted them back for fellowships.

How can the government improve? The way I see it, this is controlled by the organizations, the professional bodies. How can government be a force of good to mitigate those issues and problems that international students face?

[Michelle Jorge]

I think with the changes that have come through with CETA that specifically apply to engineers, architects, and I believe accountants and lawyers, you can make that more expansive to other professionals, and apply similar rules.

This is something that would have to be worked together with the different universities and educational organizations for it to be functioning into the future. I think that if you're able to apply what you've done in relation to those specific areas, and if you expand it to other areas, we will see some improvement.

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

This issue you're facing is that the professional associations would not let you practise unless you are part and parcel of that, whether it's the architects, professional engineers, the accountants, the CPA. That is where the issue is.

Do you have particular suggestions for the government?

[Michelle Jorge]

I think it's starting a dialogue with the specific professional organizations and making them understand the statistics of what it's costing our economy, for example, the delay in the entry of those persons entering the workforce at a higher level that's more connected to their level of education.

If we can show the superiority of the level of education in the other countries through persons who come in, eventually we'll be able to make some advancements in that regard. They will become more amenable to the suggestions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you.

That wraps up our first round. We're going to our second round.

We're going to start off with the Liberals.

Madam Lapointe, you have the floor.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank the witnesses for being with us today. We are learning a lot. I'm glad that we have representatives from the Portuguese and German communities. Not far from my riding is a community with thousands of Portuguese who hail from the Azores; they have been here for more than half a century. I would also like to recognize the community of German business people.

Mr. Beck, you said it was difficult to find the best business partnerships and matches between Canadian and German companies.

Do you have any suggestions in that regard?

[Thomas Beck]

Again, we have some business delegations coming to Canada. We have good staff who work all the time on matching the German businesses and the Canadian businesses. We created a database for that, with 50 possible Canadian candidates. We then call them and ask them if they would be interested in getting in touch with that German company. At the end of this process, there will be three to five Canadian businesses. We tell our German guests that they will visit their potential Canadian counterpart. There they have the best talks. If they need help with the language, we accompany them and so on. That works quite well.

We also bring them on Canadian trade fairs or on German trade fairs, where they can meet tons of people during a couple of days. That works, as well. This direct approach, to look in databases for Canadian companies, call them, talk to them, filter them out, and at the end both parties meet, works quite well. For years, we've done some 100 or 150 matches like this.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

As you may know, my riding is located north of Montreal. The surrounding area is home to many companies including Bell Helicopter, the manufacturer of Bombardier's C Series aircraft, L-3 MAS, and Nova Bus. Many of the companies are in the transportation industry.

You mentioned Toronto and Montreal earlier, but if you're looking for a place for your businesses to set up, you should consider our region. I mean no disrespect to my colleagues, but I would humbly encourage you to consider my riding.

[Thomas Beck]

You bet.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

We have skilled workers.

[Thomas Beck]

We are in Montreal once a month. We do a lot of business with Quebec, Alberta, B.C., Nova Scotia—with all the provinces. We have projects there and we have business partners there. We usually work together very closely with the respective provincial governments, with associations, with chambers of commerce, and so on. These are very trustful and good relationships that have developed over the years.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you.

My next question is about women in international trade and is for both organizations.

Do you offer women who own small and medium-size businesses incentives to help them enter the market?

[Thomas Beck]

As far as I know, I don't think we have special incentives for women entering international trade. In Germany I think we have many women who are already owners of a company, so probably the government does something in that respect.

I don't know about any special programs, but when we have visitors here, I would say that at least one third, if not half, are women.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Very good.

[Thomas Beck]

Have a look at our office—and here; four-fifths are women.

[Voices]

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