International Trade committee  Yes. We have planned a lot of events with our provincial partners. Actually, in British Columbia, there were several events in the fall of 2016. We have a very close relationship with Quebec. Six events are scheduled for the coming months. To my knowledge, all provinces are very

International Trade committee  I'm not aware of any specific concerns that have been raised of that genre. When we get a business case, we discuss it with our geographical and sector experts and try to identify in advance where there might be issues. That shouldn't suggest that there's 100% control over circum

International Trade committee  Thank you for your question. As a trade commissioner, we don't tell companies which markets to explore. They develop the business case. We can provide them with information in terms of where their market might fit, but ultimately the decision and the risk is theirs. We continue

International Trade committee  Very much so. In fact, as I mentioned, we're working with the provinces on CETA outreach. We've just concluded a number of sessions in Atlantic Canada and the Prairies over the last few weeks. We've had a presence there with our trade commissioners, and they're promoting the CanE

International Trade committee  We do. In fact, we monitor it on a regular basis. When we were looking at the program initially, we included full analyses of programs from countries like New Zealand and Australia. We're aware of other programs as they emerge, and we're not above looking at their good suggesti

International Trade committee  It's the same program. This was announced by the Prime Minister in March 2015 as part of the budget announcement, but the program itself was launched—

International Trade committee  The terms and conditions were approved by Minister Freeland. The mandate was to assist SMEs, so that's not changed.

International Trade committee  Absolutely. We have a very strong, ongoing relationship with EDC, with Canadian Commercial Corporation, and, in fact, with the Business Development Bank of Canada.

International Trade committee  And AgriMarketing. Elise will be meeting tomorrow with our counterparts responsible for the program, so the collaboration is very close. In response to an issue one of the members has raised, as a platform we want to make sure we don't provide too much confusion for our SME cli

International Trade committee  Absolutely. For our trade commissioners across Canada—95 of them, situated in 17 cities—their whole working day is about house calls.

International Trade committee  Thank you for your question. The guidelines in the program require that each applicant report on their success at the time they make the claims for the expenses they've incurred, and they can do that sequentially. For example, they can include one trip to a market where they've

International Trade committee  I think the needs of our SME community in their international market development are dynamic. We see with the development of eBay or Alibaba, for example, that new chains are developing for companies. In the trade commissioner service in Global Affairs we try to identify where

International Trade committee  As I mentioned, within the department we manage the business women in international trade program. That was launched in 2005. It's grown to be quite successful, and I think operates on three different pillars. One is information sharing, so it has a newsletter and a LinkedIn gr

International Trade committee  Thank you for your question. In general, they're for incremental marketing activities, overseas marketing activities, so they should be directed at a specific market—for example, France or Brazil—and they would be for those exploratory meetings. There would be an involvement in

International Trade committee  Okay. Indeed, the concept we have for this program is that in those markets where there are particular challenges, the companies can access those resources. As I mentioned in the presentation, the cap on our contributions is $99,999, so for our 50% that would mean for a particu