Mr. Speaker, in the debate on free trade agreements, my colleague has asked a pertinent question. I appreciate that.
There are tremendous opportunities throughout Asia. We are doing a number of things to pursue those opportunities. We are working hard on expanded trade agreements, for instance in China and India.
My colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Trade, just presided over the opening of yet another trade office in India about a week ago and also represented Canada very well at WTO discussions going on there.
It is my hope, and I say that carefully because we do not know what is going to happen here in the next couple of weeks, that should I be able to be in India about two weeks from now, we will be opening yet another trade office there.
We are working on a foreign investment protection agreement with India. We are getting closer. It has gone back and forth a number of times. We are working on a nuclear cooperation agreement with China. We are also pursuing similar initiatives.
I will use one example and then I will close on this. The former minister of trade in India expressed India's concern about their agriculture which is mostly subsistence-level farming competing against an industrialized country like Canada which has a very mature and sophisticated agricultural industry. India does not want to embark on a full and formal free trade agreement. They are open to enhanced trade.
We look at the areas where we can improve, and though a free trade agreement may not be imminent we are able to expand our trade opportunities with many of these Asian countries.