OTTAWA — Canada’s small business, export promotion and international trade minister, Mary Ng, had little to say about the newly signed U.S.-China trade deal last week, saying her office was reviewing it.
Details of the first phase of the deal show China is committed to buying an additional US$40 to $50 billion in agricultural products from the U.S. With no quotas listed, many are questioning the impact on Canadian agricultural exporters.
Asked about concerns that the early phases of that deal may cause Canadian farmers to lose market share, Ng repeated that the government is taking a close look at the agreement.
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“The sector is very, very important to us, and we will continue to work hard on their behalf,” she said.
Ng was also non-committal when asked if she had any concerns over what appears to be a potential violation of international trade rules within the agreement. Given the deal only applies to certain goods, it may violate the World Trade Organization’s “most favoured nation” rules that prevent favouring some markets over the discrimination of others.
Ng continues to work toward a solution on the impasse at the WTO, making it one of her priorities at the World Economic Summit in Davos, Switzerland.
Currently the WTO is unable to deliver trade dispute rulings because the U.S. blocked the appointment of a needed adjudicator after it failed to reach an agreement with member states over how appeals are handled.
“The WTO and the rules-based system help our Canadian businesses because they have the rules that they can depend on which helps them make the decisions, the business decisions, that they need to make to take on the risk that they need to take on because they can rely on a rule-basis system that works,” said Ng.
She said work continues among the “Ottawa group” — a collection of like-minded countries trying to reform the WTO.
“We are working together, particularly around the appellate body and looking to find interim solutions … so that we have an ability to be able to deal with trade disputes,” she said.
While Ng said she is willing to work with “anyone who wants to work with Canada” on reforms, China, a country that continues to block some Canadian canola shippers and, as a result, is the focus of a Canadian complaint to the WTO, is not among the countries involved.
“The Ottawa group already has a number of countries that are there and we’re going to encourage anyone who wants to work with us, particularly around the reforms and these reforms to ensure that there is a continual of a rules-based system,” she said.
Dan Darling, president of the Canadian Agri-Food Trade Alliance (CAFTA) said in a written statement he was pleased Ng was defending the global trading system.
“Given the vital role the WTO’s dispute settlement system plays for Canadian exporters, we call on all WTO members to seek an urgent resolution to the current impasse in appointments to the WTO Appellate Body. It is encouraging to see Minister Ng chairing this meeting as Canada needs to be a driving force for rules-based trade globally.
The minister also reiterated Canada’s goal of increasing annual agricultural exports to $75 billion by 2025.
“We’re going to continue to work with our Canadian farmers and explore opportunities to open new markets for you know, for Canadian, agriculture and agricultural products,” she said. “We absolutely want to always create markets and help our Canadian farmers get more ready, have more support, so that they can, in fact grow their operations, you know, domestically and grow them into those markets.”
