International Trade committee  Thank you for your attention. We look forward to some meaningful things, and we'll watch for your proposals in the House.

International Trade committee  My sense is that Canadians don't realize how well they're liked in that region and how much better they're liked than the U.S at this moment in time. The U.S. has trade agreements because they've pushed harder than we have. But even if we go there this late in the game with an approach to do trade agreements, I think they can be done very quickly and the results would be quite phenomenal.

International Trade committee  The minister referred to a couple of items in the speech he gave. There was a reference, I believe, to bilateral agreements creating centres of excellence and responding to the needs of business. What permeates from this document is a shift from doing social programs by giving aid to doing social programs by building economy.

International Trade committee  —is whether in ten years we can look back and say all of us were part of making this successful.

International Trade committee  My view is that they go together. Encourage another fifty Canadian companies to invest in this region of the world and they can create another 15,000, 20,000, or name however many thousands of jobs. You're getting a return on this investment because Canadian companies are making money, and you can take a portion of that money, as a Canadian government, and invest it directly into infrastructure, whether it's airports, port authorities, or whatever.

International Trade committee  Maybe I could comment, but David and Paul will probably want to comment as well. We've lobbied, and we've lobbied hard. The one hurdle we haven't gotten over with our lobbying—and this has been the case for a number of years—is that we can do way more with the same amount of money in the pot.

International Trade committee  Yes, for sure. The CNN factor about the Middle East is real. You have many companies thinking that if they go the Middle East, they're going to be threatened, or it will be very difficult. I can tell you that we've operated in Yemen since 1993, and we have never lost one day of production.

International Trade committee  The trade missions that don't work are the ones that say, “Nexen, do you have any deals that you have signed, and can we come and be part of the photo-op?” That's ridiculous. In those cases, we don't need any help. We already have the deal. What we need is the front-end work, where a company like SNC–Lavalin is going to a country in the Middle East or in Africa for the first time, where there's risk and potential, but no deal is even in the offing.

International Trade committee  I think it's a good point. When it comes to travel, I always look back to what we do in our normal lives. As members of Parliament, you understand totally how important it is to know the people on the main street in your hometowns. Really, you can extend that example to the main street in Yemen or the main street in Dubai.

International Trade committee  I think it's all of the above. Starting with this committee, I think you need ministers going through the country on a regular basis. They don't have to stay a long time, but they have to go and fly the flag. I would like to see an embassy or an office; all the other G-8 countries have embassies in Yemen.

International Trade committee  I'm sure all of you have heard the story from Ambassador Nasher, who is a wonderful person and a great emissary for his country.

International Trade committee  I'll ask Paul to comment on this, but I would start off by saying that North Africa is a good example. I think the bilaterals the U.S. is doing are very simplified models that just solve a problem. They're not looking at a huge trade agreement that will take five or 10 years to negotiate.

International Trade committee  I'm the vice-president for government relations, and our department implemented a scholarship program in Yemen. We have now selected 90 students to attend university in Calgary. Once Nexen does the selection, every year 10 new students will come to Calgary and get their complete degree paid for by the company.

International Trade committee  I'd just use the example, again, of the number of employees we have in Yemen. If you do some quick calculations on the amount of tax Nexen pays to the federal government--and our employees pay to both the federal and the provincial governments--it's multi-millions of dollars every year.

International Trade committee  Those are the kinds of things I think this committee should be asking of the staff who do this kind of work. I think they would be able to provide that information for you. I know as a practitioner of business development in the oil industry that when I go to Angola and we are bidding on blocks offshore, we are competing with the national oil company from China.