International Trade Committee on April 21st, 2026

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

Thank you very much.

I have a question for Ms. Tansey.

At the International Development Research Centre, do you have an opinion on improving sustainable agricultural productivity to establish food security that we could share on both sides? You talk a lot about partnerships between African countries and Canada.

[Erin Tansey]

Thank you, madam.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Give a brief answer, Ms. Tansey.

[Erin Tansey]

We have some examples of how Canadian and African universities, researchers and technologies have worked together. I can go into more detail, but we have those examples, absolutely.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Savard-Tremblay, please go ahead for six minutes.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to thank all the witnesses for being here and for their remarks today.

I'll start with you, Mr. Warin. Correct me if I'm wrong; I don't want to misinterpret what you said. You talked about optimizing the relationship with the Americans. That goes a bit against the flow, as I'm sure you're aware. That isn't quite what we have been hearing these days, and for several months now. Could you elaborate on that? I imagine that you have the means to prove it to us as a data expert, but let us just say that it comes as a bit of a surprise to hear you say that.

[Thierry Warin]

Thank you for the question.

In fact, businesses are the ones that conduct trade, and we, in universities, and government agencies are the ones that collect the data and aggregate it for a country. As a professor, I teach you that trade is between Canada and the United States, in particular. In reality, trade is first done by businesses. Businesses are the ones that decide to send products or use resources elsewhere on the planet to improve their productivity. Overall, this boosts a country's productivity.

How does a business decide to go abroad to get resources or export finished products? Up until now, that has been decided by humans. People go to trade shows, use the services of delegations or embassies, in particular, to get information. That reduces what is called information asymmetries. People are ultimately optimizing, but they're still subject to statistical biases, because they don't have perfect, complete information. Is this person I'm signing a contract with really the best person? Is the agreement I have signed really the best? Is this the highest price I can get?

Today, thanks to artificial intelligence techniques and data science, we're able to know, for instance—I was talking about auto parts; I meant buses—whether it would be better to sell them to Norway instead, taking into account the transport costs. However, is the port of Montreal able to do that? This raises other questions.

Today, we're indeed able to reduce that noise, that fog of trade wars. We can reduce all of that thanks to artificial intelligence techniques and data collection. That means that, today, we can also know which of our products can be sold at a better price elsewhere than the United States, not just because we think it's negative or because there's a political risk. No, it's because we can make more money if that product goes somewhere else on the planet. We can also know that we may not be the best partners for the United States when it comes to certain products either. Those are things that will be interesting to watch this year in July.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

In your opening remarks, I think you mentioned the Heckscher‑Ohlin‑Samuelson model, which is sort of a follow-up to Ricardo's model. Your demonstration seems to lean somewhat toward that model. However, we have recently had the impression that the trend was more toward short supply chains, toward bringing the various development and processing centres closer together, and so on.

Is that what you're seeing? It also seems to be at odds with what you just said.

[Thierry Warin]

In fact, what's happening is that there was a lot of discussion about short supply chains when it came to sustainable development considerations. That narrative changed a bit following the last election in the United States, in particular. Now, it's important not to abandon it.

We can now also take into account transportation costs and find out whether there are other markets—I gave you the example of Norway—but it's also important to internalize negative externalities. It would be interesting to know whether this would enable us to put a price on our supply chains, and so on. Could it also enable our trade to be even more optimal from this perspective of sustainable development, which is quite natural?

I'm a methodology professor, and I'd say that we can now answer questions that previously relied on implicit assumptions: The market will adapt; if ever my partner in the United States isn't the best, I'll find another one that will be better. No. There's a lot of resilience, a lot of resistance, actually, and inelasticity in that.

Today, the government, the government agencies—I also heard representatives of Quebec delegations saying so—and the agencies in Canada's embassies are there, and they have and will have increasingly effective tools to optimize our trade.

[Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot—Acton, QC]

On that note, where are we with university research right now?

We know all the limits of the GDP indicator. There can often be real cases of communities becoming poorer because of an increase in GDP. There are all sorts of cases that attest to that.

What data do we have now? What do we have as alternative indicators?

[Thierry Warin]

Where does the research stand today, including research on international trade? We can collect data on businesses, products, sectors and, as a result, countries. On top of that, if I can collect data on businesses and the products they sell, I can model supply chains, look at the markets in which they operate, and look at the best markets and the opportunities that they haven't exploited. Again, the role of governments is to provide that information as well, to be a platform, in fact.

When I have information on businesses, I can find out their life cycles, I can regroup those businesses into industrial sectors, which are sometimes new. As a result, I can see the new life cycles of industrial sectors. Many of them are industrial clusters. In this way, I can measure the life cycles of industrial clusters from birth to death.

Today, thanks to the tools we have and by taking a geographic unit that's the most—

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much, Mr. Warin. I'm sorry to cut you off.

If you could supply to the clerk for the committee some of the data that you're referencing, committee members would very much appreciate it.

Mr. Chambers, you have the floor for five minutes, please.

[Adam Chambers, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Welcome to our witnesses. Thank you for your testimony so far.

I have a question I'll pose to all three panellists. I'll start with Mr. Warin, so others have a bit more time to think about the answer.

What would you say, in your estimation, would be the top one or two opportunities for Canada in expanding trade? What is the biggest risk that you think the government should consider when expanding and diversifying trade?

[Thierry Warin]

We need resources and institutions. I think the biggest risk in this diversification strategy is finding the right partners, including strong institutions that respect and properly enforce contracts. Doing business means signing contracts. Really, it's about having countries in which the legal system is actually going to ensure compliance with those contracts, compliance for the parties.

[Adam Chambers, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Kalu.

[Macaulay Kalu]

Regarding the aspect of areas of interest, first of all, there are a few things happening concerning Canada's relationship with Africa. One thing is that Canada doesn't have a FIPA with any African country, but it has over 51 agreements outside of Africa. I think that would help, because when you have an agreement, you have the terms and conditions for doing trade. We don't have that kind of agreement.

Even Canada's Africa strategy is just directional. It's not operational. Of course, there needs to be a process to support infrastructure. FIPAs and FTAs would really help us support that. If the House can move that recommendation and support this, we'd move faster on the aspect of foreign trade. There are a few key things, like the coal price, for example. That's a major opportunity for Canadian markets in Africa, for preservation and things like agro-processing products. These are some important areas to look into.

[Erin Tansey]

The biggest opportunity, for Canada in particular, is in really investing in knowledge and innovation systems in Canada and Africa that link high-quality trade, trade-oriented evidence, policy collaboration and policy learning. This is going to allow trade barriers constraining entrepreneurship to be tackled.

Similarly, some may say that the greatest risk is political instability in these parts of the world, but we know, as pointed out by my two colleagues here, that the knowledge we have right here in Canada—in the Canadian diaspora and organizations like IDRC, which has an office on the ground in Senegal and other parts of Africa—can be used to dissuade or lessen the perceived risk of working in this region.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

You have one minute left.

[Adam Chambers, Conservative, Simcoe North, ON]

Perhaps I'll ask a quick yes-or-no question and go through the panel again.

Do you think a trade agreement should include clauses with respect to human rights, gender and climate change, or do you think they should just be economic documents?

[Thierry Warin]

I'll refrain from answering that question, since I'm not an expert on the subject.

[Macaulay Kalu]

Once again, I think everything depends on the interests of the country that wants to do trade. You can define your conditions and look at the economic importance in the policy framework around what you want to achieve. Sometimes, when it comes to the aspect of human rights and all that, policy can be a support system.

That's where a collaborative policy framework can help those countries. It's not based on detecting the process but on supporting it through what I call love, intentionality and balance. Once you have a care model in your approach to supporting the country you want to do business with and you have your intention in what you want to achieve through that process.... I think Canada is always fair, compared with any country that wants to go into the market. With the aspects of love, care, intentionality and balance, I think based on what you're asking for, we can achieve that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much.

Next is Mr. Naqvi for five minutes.

[Yasir Naqvi, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you to all the panellists for attending in person and virtually.

Mr. Kalu, there are two points you made that caught my interest, and I want you to expand on them. You spoke about a hub-and-spoke model, and you referenced South Africa, Morocco and Nigeria. Can you elaborate on what you mean by that hub-and-spoke model? How do you see that in operation, and how can Canada enable it?

[Macaulay Kalu]

The hub-and-spoke model is something that I believe will really help us in the aspect of always mentioning Africa as a country. It helps you narrow down your process.

For example, South Africa is already our number one trade partner. Using the process of looking at what is working and expanding it within the region is very helpful. When it comes to South Africa, you have the SADC and now the COMESA. That even includes eastern and southern Africa. Now you also have Nigeria, which is our second-biggest trade partner. Using that, you have an opportunity to enter other regions—Nigeria and its neighbouring countries. Then, of course, you have Morocco, which is a migrant region that already has the systems, infrastructure and things like that to support the aspect of trade.

I believe there is a big opportunity for Canada to have a starting point and reduce the long process of conversation and bureaucracy. This would make us move faster and reduce to a 10-year plan what was maybe a 12- to 24-year plan for achieving that goal.

[Yasir Naqvi, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Speaking in response to one of the questions from my colleagues on the role of the diaspora, I very strongly believe that the diaspora can play a very important role in opening trade channels not only in Africa but across the world. Canada is very fortunate to be one of the most multicultural countries. People come from all over the world with strong family and commercial ties. As a country, we can do a better job in taking advantage of diaspora connections.

I'll start with Professor Kalu, and then I'd love to hear from Professor Warin and Ms. Tansey as well.

In the context of Africa, what role do you see for diaspora communities based in Canada that are successful professionally and commercially in enhancing trade opportunities between Canada and the African continent?