International Trade committee  There have been a lot of cultural activities to try to bring together the Spanish-speaking, the Hispanic population. The Portuguese population, to a great extent, has roots back in Portugal more than in Brazil, although there have been a significant number of Brazilians coming to

International Trade committee  Yes, it is important, because the entire effort is about trying to bring the countries and Canada closer in their trade, and not exclusively in their trade but also their knowledge of each other and understanding of each other, which is very important for the purpose of identifyi

International Trade committee  Yes.

International Trade committee  It's also very important, the fact that the Cuban immigration that went into the U.S. was an immigration of cultured and rich people, and they have had tremendous success in the U.S. It's not an immigrant group that has stayed at low levels; it has moved up academically and in th

International Trade committee  It was not pure arm-twisting by the prime minister or the Spanish crown to the companies. It was with support to convince them to support it. It was the need also of Spain to support the former colonies, if you want to put it that way. The cultural relations are very strong, and

International Trade committee  As I mentioned earlier, the mining industry was a very protected industry in the past and opened up to foreign companies—and actually, not even to foreign companies, but even to proper exploitation—in the last 20 years or less in many of the countries in Latin America. I'm not ta

International Trade committee  I don't have the precise information, but I would guess it has to do with development that has been going on in the countries, the industrial development and self-sufficiency in some aspects that have substituted some Canadian imports. It is not that some regional agreement has s

International Trade committee  We have had some success on that. You can look at what Nortel has been able to do, what companies like Husky plastic injection molding and CAE have done in Brazil, and what Alcan has done in the past. Brascan has been there for over 65 years. They have been able to bring in added

International Trade committee  The trade flows, obviously, that you see in the Andean community involve Canada's exporting proteins--foodstuffs--and in return, importing many of the extracted minerals that many Canadian companies have been exploiting. Where would the trade flows be? Right now, I think when w

International Trade committee  We heard Mr. Frankel's comments initially. Countries in Latin America have progressed enormously from where they were. The situation with protectionism, military governments, the lack of protection of civil rights, adopting neo-liberal economic policies to try to reverse all th

International Trade committee  The first attempt, or more than an attempt, to integrate has been MERCOSUR. But MERCOSUR was more of a political alliance than an economic alliance. As such, when you have economies that start moving in different directions, MERCOSUR was put to a test that it could not pass. I'

International Trade committee  Some of the countries in the Andean community have experienced significant changes and economic problems. Ecuador has had severe economic problems, Bolivia has had political changes, and many political events have taken place in Venezuela. So they may not have had the purchasing

International Trade committee  I'd like to mention that Canada's interest and focus of attention in Latin America and the Caribbean has been more toward investment than trade. In the last ten years, investment by Canadian enterprises has grown by about 11% per annum in Latin America. Investments there today ar

International Trade committee  Canada has been selective in terms of the countries that have trade or investment, according to where those flows have been identified and serviced.

International Trade committee  Definitely.