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Potential for Canada-China trade 'almost unlimited': Canadian Minister

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-12-24 11:32

Opportunities for Canada-China trade relations are "almost unlimited," Canadian Minister of International Trade Stockwell Day said Tuesday.

"The opportunities are almost unlimited. In fact, even the sky is not the limit because what we can trade back and forth in the aero and space industries. There's huge potential there," Day, who also holds the portfolio of minister for Asia-Pacific Gateway, told a Canada-China business forum.

With China's significant growth in recent years and the path the country has embarked on, there were great opportunities for both sides, Day told Xinhua in an exclusive interview prior to his speech.

"There are great opportunities for Canada. Not just on the commodities side, but in terms of technology, in terms of assisting with that growth." he said.

"Just the automobile market alone (with) something around one percent of people living in China have automobiles, there is a huge market there for environmentally-sensitive, highly-efficient automobile products," he said. "Canada has a great history there, (with) lots to share on the engineering and technology side."

Day, who made his second trip to China earlier this month when he accompanied Prime Minister Stephen Harper on his inaugural visit to the country, called China's recent granting of Approved Destination Status to Canada "very helpful" and something it had been seeking since the 1990s. Canada was the last major Western country to receive the status.

The minister estimated that travel by Chinese to Canada would increase by up to 50 percent over the next five years and each 50,000 visitors would be worth about C$100 million Canadian dollars ($96.4 million) to the economy. Last year, nearly 160,000 Chinese visited Canada.

"We know that through the last few years we have already seen an increase in travel and trade, and having this status will move it forward in a very significant way," Day told Xinhua.

"I think we'll see this increase greatly, especially with the (Winter) Olympics coming (to Vancouver in February). The timing of this is very good," he added.

The minister said people living in China want to see and know more about Canada, while Canadians are very impressed with what is going on with China.

"This type of exchange is going to be positive, not just on the cultural side and the building of important personal relationships, but the business, economic and academic relationships that will develop are very exciting," he said.

Despite its proximity across the Pacific and having diplomatic relations for nearly 40 years, Canada's trade with China still lags behind other Western countries.

According to Statistics Canada, China was Canada's fourth biggest export market in 2008.

The Fraser Institute, the Canada-based think tank, said in a report released earlier this year that Malaysia and Australia, both with smaller populations than Canada, did more business with China.

With the success of Harper's visit earlier this month, Day said he expected the trade with China to grow with greater investment between the two countries.

He said the target areas included agriculture and its related technologies, gas, oil and nuclear technology, as well as energy-efficient and environmental technologies. Resources, particularly minerals, are a main focus area.

"There's a lot of resource exchange going on," Day said, "The growth that is going on in China is phenomenal... We have not only the raw commodities but we have the value-added capabilities."

"On the environmental side, which China is very much concerned about these days, we have the alternative technologies and ways to develop not just efficient fuels, but efficient construction methods," Day said.

"All of those types of things fit very well into what China has in mind for its own future," he told Xinhua.