By Steve Scherer
OTTAWA, Nov 23 (Reuters) – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s authorities realized a lesson when former U.S. President Donald Trump compelled the renegotiation of the North American commerce pact 5 years in the past: by no means underestimate U.S. protectionism.
In latest speeches to Washington policymakers and in its overseas coverage alignment with the USA over China, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and on Arctic defenses, Canadian officers try to make sure their nation’s highly effective southern neighbor acknowledges the worth of its friendship.
The following U.S. presidential election is lower than two years away and Trump final week mentioned he would run once more, suggesting the “America first” commerce coverage might once more be on the poll. Even with out Trump, the USA has proven indicators of changing into more and more leery of free commerce in recent times.
Trump slapped tariffs on Canadian aluminum and metal throughout his time period, whereas President Joe Biden thought-about tax incentives for American carmakers that will have harm Canada’s auto sector, earlier than abandoning the concept in August after a significant lobbying effort from Ottawa.
“You at all times should have a thoughts to (the U.S. election in) 2024… When America goes America first, they overlook Canada’s proper subsequent door,” mentioned a senior supply acquainted with the Canadian authorities’s considering on overseas coverage.
Protectionist insurance policies that harm Canada are “an even bigger danger with Trump as a result of he is so unpredictable and mercurial,” mentioned Roland Paris, Trudeau’s former overseas coverage adviser and professor of worldwide affairs at the College of Ottawa.
However Trump displays a broader shift away from free commerce in U.S. politics “that may be a problem for Canada in coping with any U.S. administration,” Paris mentioned.
Canada, in consequence, is poised to introduce an Indo-Pacific technique as quickly as subsequent week that in some ways mirrors the one with the identical identify launched by the USA earlier this yr, each aiming to counter Chinese language energy within the area.
On the identical time, the Trudeau authorities is busy selling Canada as a possible different provider to China, particularly on essential minerals like cobalt, manganese, lithium and graphite for electrical car batteries, a market the Chinese language now dominate.
CANADA-CHINA TENSIONS
Canadian and Chinese language relations have been chilly since Canada’s arrest of Huawei Applied sciences government Meng Wanzhou in 2018 on a U.S. extradition request, and Beijing’s subsequent arrest of two Canadians on spying prices. That standoff ended final yr.
Two conferences between Trudeau and China’s President Xi Jinping on the G20 summit final week laid naked ongoing tensions. Within the second chat, Xi admonished Trudeau for leaking the contents of their first assembly, the place he introduced up Chinese language “interference” in Canada’s elections.
“I do not need to undermine the Indo-Pacific technique by saying it is fully about the USA, as a result of it isn’t, however having a powerful Indo-Pacific technique can also be necessary in our bilateral relationship with the USA,” the senior supply mentioned.
Trudeau and International Minister Melanie Joly toured the Indo-Pacific area final week, assembly with leaders and asserting new investments to assist construct infrastructure within the area.
Business Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne this week is main a commerce delegation to Japan and Korea.
“The Indo-Pacific technique is about diversification” of provide chains, Champagne instructed Reuters on Friday, saying he wished to convey the message that: “We could be your provider of selection, particularly on the subject of essential minerals, on the subject of vitality.” It was his third journey to Japan in six months.
In October, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland echoed an concept that U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen first introduced up earlier this yr about “friend-shoring” or outsourcing supply chains to trusted international locations, as a substitute of counting on authoritarian governments like Russia or China.
“The place democracies have to be strategically weak, we ought to be weak to one another,” Freeland mentioned in a speech on the Brookings Establishment coverage think-tank in Washington.
Ten days later, Champagne took an identical message to a panel dialogue for enterprise leaders in Washington, urging a “decoupling” from China.
Canada is not going to be caught off-guard by U.S. protectionist urges, mentioned the senior supply.
“It is pure that over time, folks overlook that their neighbors have a lawnmower they’ll borrow. We’re saying we’re proper right here. We have it.”
($1 = 1.3449 Canadian {dollars})
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