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<html> <head> <meta name="Generator" content="Corel WordPerfect 8"> <meta name="DATE" content="0/0/0"> <meta name="Author" content="Jeff Meldrum"> <title>MR. PETTIGREW - ADDRESS TO THE ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE ASSOCIATIONS COUNCIL OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS - MONT-TREMBLANT, QUEBEC</title> </head> <body text="#000000" link="#0000ff" vlink="#551a8b" alink="#ff0000" bgcolor="#c0c0c0"> 2001/26 CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY NOTES FOR AN ADDRESS BY THE HONOURABLE PIERRE PETTIGREW, MINISTER FOR INTERNATIONAL TRADE, TO THE ANNUAL CONFERENCE OF THE ASSOCIATIONS COUNCIL OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MANUFACTURERS "CANADA-U.S. TRADE AND THE TREND TOWARD NORTH AMERICAN ECONOMIC INTEGRATION" MONT-TREMBLANT, Quebec August 2, 2001 (12:30 p.m. EDT) It is a pleasure to be with you today, and it is an honour to address the members of two such distinguished organizations, in particular our American guests. NAM and CME: Important Contributors to Public Policy For over 100 years, the National Association of Manufacturers [NAM] has been promoting the interests of U.S. manufacturing firms and the millions of men and women they employ. Your association has witnessed a great deal of change on the economic landscape and has played a key role in the political and economic development of the United States. Indeed, your Web site highlights one of your more recent and meaningful political accomplishments. It reads: "NAM-member lobbying helps secure Permanent Normal Trade Relations between China and the U.S." In my opinion, that is an excellent illustration of the important yet still growing link between manufacturing and trade. It is responsible players like you who will no doubt help to ensure that the Administration achieves one of its key priorities -- a solid Trade Promotion Authority that covers the WTO [World Trade Organization] as well as the FTAA [Free Trade Area of the Americas]. The Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters [CME], capably led by my friend Perrin Beatty, have themselves been a critical player on the Canadian scene over the years, in their various forms, and continue to be an important contributor to the development of public policy in Canada. Trade: The Engine of Growth I know that your organizations share my enthusiasm for foreign trade. That is not surprising, considering the ample supporting evidence. Canada and the United States have the largest and most comprehensive trading relationship in the world. Two-way trade between our countries is now US$1.3 billion a day. More than 80 percent of all Canadian exports go to the U.S., while nearly a quarter of U.S. exports come to Canada. Canada's exports to the U.S. generate 38 percent of our gross domestic product [GDP]. Over two million jobs in each country are tied to our mutual trade. Looking beyond the numbers, it is clear that companies in Canada and the U.S. have prospered in the new business environment created by the Free Trade Agreement [FTA] of 1989 and the North American Free Trade Agreement [NAFTA]. Rewarding new partnerships have emerged in research and development, production, marketing and distribution. The free flow of goods, people and services across the border makes firms more competitive and gives consumers in both countries access to a wider variety of products. Impact of the NAFTA, Promise of the FTAA The impact of the NAFTA has been especially dramatic. By any measure, the NAFTA has been a resounding success. It has created tremendous growth and prosperity for the United States, Canada and Mexico. The total trade among the three countries has expanded from US$306 billion in 1993 to US$665 billion in 2000, an increase of 117 percent. From 1993 to 2000, Canada's exports to the U.S. and Mexico rose by 110 percent, from US$115.0 billion to US$242 billion. The rise in trade has led to increased employment and prosperity in all three countries. Since the NAFTA took effect, employment in Canada has grown by 16 percent, generating 2.1 million new jobs. During the same period, employment in Mexico has grown by 19 percent (6.2 million new jobs), and in the U.S. by 12 percent (15 million jobs). Given the phenomenal success of the NAFTA, I am convinced that Canada and the U.S. stand to gain a great deal from a future Free Trade Area of the Americas. As you may know, the FTAA will be the largest free trade zone in the world. With a population of 800 million and a combined GDP of US$12 trillion a year, its potential is enormous. The Importance of a Rules-based System But all that we have achieved in the WTO and the NAFTA, and all we hope to achieve in the FTAA and other regional initiatives, proves the importance of a rules-based trading system. I know that your organizations are firmly committed to the WTO, and I know that NAM took great pride in its successful efforts to defeat a proposal in the U.S. Congress to withdraw congressional support for U.S. membership in the WTO. I congratulate you for your commitment to this international body. Unfortunately, it appears that some of your fellow citizens do not share your enthusiasm for the WTO. Your press and your politicians focus all too often on the constraints that international rules impose upon you. Well, why wouldn't they? We do it here in Canada too: it is only natural to want to be able to reap the benefits of trade -- reliable suppliers, promising markets -- while preserving one's own freedom of action. I'm sure you're aware of the challenges we face in sectors such as softwood lumber or agriculture, and the legitimate different points of view over the best way to resolve them. As a practitioner of the politics of confidence, I like to think of our bilateral differences as opportunities, not problems. What makes them opportunities, in my view, is that they force us to think of new ways forward. We cannot disengage from each other. We cannot close our eyes and pretend that the other does not exist. On the contrary, we have to think big if we are to find solutions. In building the FTAA together, and in working together to launch a broader round of WTO negotiations, Canada and the United States are "thinking big," just as we are in taking on our border issues, or the challenges of North American integration. Before I come back to the Canada/United States relationship, let me take a moment to talk about that bigger world of the FTAA and the WTO. I have to say that operating a rules-based system is becoming more complex as the world trading system comes of age. The developing world is flexing its muscles, although it is still learning that responsibility comes with power. Outsiders like China and Russia are moving into the WTO fold -- and I can promise you that China will make a difference in the near future. Power in the system is beginning to disperse in every way -- from big countries to smaller ones, from richer to poorer, from corporations to consumers, from governments to issue-oriented citizens' groups. All this adds up to an epoch of change that recalls the postwar period: it won't be as dramatic and it certainly won't be as fast, but we are engaged in a process of reshaping the world economic order to serve such goals as sustainable development and social equity, and history will judge this process as significant as the explosion of multilateralism that gave us the UN and the Bretton Woods institutions over half a century ago. This is heady stuff, I know! And if you are asking yourselves why I should be taking the high road of world development and inclusion with you, then let me bring it back home: none of this will happen without the United States, and I think it is in the immediate interest -- not just the long-term interest -- of everyone, Canada included, that the U.S. continue to be a leader here. That is why Canada worries about "go-it-alone" tendencies in the United States. If we do not want to see an increase in public anxiety over globalization, we must do everything we can to ensure that the legitimacy and credibility of international institutions are not called into question. Two critical "public tests" must be passed: firstly, globalization must be seen to bring shared benefits; secondly, there must be no suggestion that a country can benefit from the rules when it suits it, but escape the system when it doesn't. Governments around the world have sold the WTO to their publics as a mechanism to level the playing field between big and small and provide stability and predictability where there was little of it before. A system where everyone -- from the great powers to the tiny economies -- agrees to play by the same rules. While the violent street protesters have been largely discredited for their tactics, we should remember that both they and their more peaceful allies will continue to garner a great deal of media attention. As such, we should be mindful of the fact that they will exploit whatever inequities they perceive in the world economic and financial system. To the extent they are able to do this, they may yet be able to swing public sentiment more in their favour. So we should avoid giving them any grounds for complaint. The Future: The "Seamless" Border Responsible leadership is often burdensome, but as world leaders in political, economic and social development, we in Canada and the U.S. have a special obligation to demonstrate to our citizens that the new system is fair, open and beneficial. After all, that is the only way that we will be able to move toward a goal we both share: the "seamless" border. Global economic integration and competition requires a seamless border as the foundation of the economic vitality of the world's two largest trading partners. This is absolutely essential. Companies with plants and production lines on both sides of the border have come to depend on "just in time" delivery of components. The border is the central nervous system for our economies, particularly the Canadian economy, which is so focussed on trade with the U.S. Stoppages and delays at the border can have a dramatic impact on our economic prosperity. With the huge amounts of trade flowing across the border increasing by 11 percent each year, and 200 million travellers crossing each year, "getting it right" is critical to both countries. Our two governments have recognized the paramount importance of taking action on the border. In October 1999, Prime Minister Chrétien and former President Clinton launched the Canada-U.S. Partnership [CUSP] Forum to promote a high-level dialogue on a future vision of the border. There were meetings with stakeholders and border agencies in Niagara-Buffalo and in Vancouver-Blaine. The CUSP report, released last December, was a joint one of both governments, and every word in it was agreed upon by both parties. One of its key recommendations to leaders was that "border agencies continue to pursue co-operation to build on successes and identify new practices." This means that our two countries must continue to look at clearing vehicles via electronic information exchange and reducing each other's inspection processes. It also means that our two governments will look at copying best practices. But, even more importantly, the report recommended that "governments need to undertake a concentrated assessment of what we do at the border. Are there regulations, legislation or policies that can be streamlined, harmonized or consolidated? Can new arrangements be put in place away from the internal border but at the external border." Our future agenda is clear. We must look at further harmonization of standards and processes. We must look at planning a more efficient cross-border transportation network. We must look at the feasibility of land preclearance for cargo. We must look at facilitating travel for business persons. And we must look at moving toward perimeter strategies for many of our processes and procedures. Our two nations can lead by example and act as a model for an increasingly interconnected world, where borders must be seen as welcoming thresholds, not forbidding barriers. Conclusion At the border crossing that brings together Douglas, British Columbia, and Blaine, Washington, there is a peace arch that was dedicated in 1921 -- 80 years ago. One of its inscriptions reads "May these gates never close." That hopeful phrase perfectly captures the sentiment of my message to you today. Our two nations share a history of great friendship and rewarding partnership. I am certain that, by continuing to work together to facilitate closer ties and increased trade, we will build a more prosperous future for citizens in every part of our continent. Thank you. </body> </html>

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Last Updated: 2006-10-30	Top of Page	Important Notices