International Trade committee  I can answer that immediately. Yes, quality does count, and we are recognized as a high-quality centre of innovation and high technology. We also have a reputation for fair business practice, so that if you deal with Canada or Canadians generally, you are on pretty solid footing

International Trade committee  You've touched on a very important point. A big element of international commerce is engagement. A lot of what gets done is based on personal relationships. You have to be present. You have to show up. You have to be willing to commit and come back. That, I think, as much as anyt

International Trade committee  I'll give you my coordinates and suggest to you that our regional offices are always doing seminars. They'll take it on the road and—

International Trade committee  That's the communications piece, and that's my problem, but we'll undertake to do that on your behalf.

International Trade committee  One element we are especially interested in is success. The successful companies often do not want to share that type of information because it is very sensitive. They do not necessarily want to specify that they received a $100-million contract. Sometimes they just tell us that

International Trade committee  Sure. The global commerce strategy was premised on three things: boosting market access; increasing Canada's share of global investment, innovation, and talent; and strengthening Canada's international commercial network. As to the commercial network, one of the big developmen

International Trade committee  We're always examining the services and the approach that we have. As a matter of fact, we have annual meetings with UKTI, Austrade, and the New Zealand Trade and Enterprise people, where we talk with them about what they're doing and what we do. We've come out pretty well, but y

International Trade committee  First of all, there's a departmental mechanism that provides for the briefing of members of Parliament. I'm more than willing to work with any member of Parliament to assist him or her in promoting the interests of firms in their ridings or region or province. That's an undertaki

International Trade committee  We have 23 points of service in the United States.

International Trade committee  Again, my understanding is that this committee was briefed by our colleagues on the Buy American provisions in the proposed American Jobs Act last week. So the record would be whatever answers they provided to you on that. I am not going to—

International Trade committee  The model that we used, Mr. Easter, is called the integrative trade model. It covers everything from education to marketing through merchandise exports, to investment, to Canadian investment abroad, to science and technology, to innovation. It's that full range of activity, all o

International Trade committee  It's an interesting example that you chose, because it's actually one I'm familiar with. We have a presence in Summerside because of the work that we did in Italy, where there are very highly developed systems and processes and very innovative approaches. There were Italian firms

International Trade committee  I cannot go digging in their sandbox. That’s always difficult professionally.

International Trade committee  I think particularly for SMEs, the biggest risk is time. When you have a very small operation and you're reliant on a very small number of individuals who are dealing with key dimensions of your business, if a person has to absent themself to go on a trip for a week or two, you'r

International Trade committee  We have 18 domestic offices and our headquarters operation.