manufacturing ceo: early renegotiation of trade deal preferable to tariff uncertainty
canadian manufacturers’ and exporters’ ceo dennis darby...
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windsor, ont. : february 3, 2025 -- a truck heads to the ambassador bridge from windsor on monday, february 3, 2025.
dan janisse
/
windsor star
canadian manufacturers’ and exporters’ ceo dennis darby said an early start to renegotiating the usmca trade deal is preferable to the current state of economic uncertainty that president donald trump has created with his tariff threats and unpredictable demands.
“we’ve suspected from the beginning of these musings that he wants to renegotiate the usmca early,” darby told the star in a phone interview. “of course, tariffs contravene a valid trade agreement.
“from a manufacturers point of view, (early renegotiation) would probably be preferable. to be in set of negotiations with u.s. and mexico to figure out what does he really want, would be preferable and more orderly than doing it in the media.”
though trump hasn’t defined his end game, darby said manufacturing officials in canada, mexico and u.s. are not waiting for a confirmation from a president who is announcing new ideas, policies and threats in scatter-shot fashion on a daily basis
“at this point it’s not clear that is the end game, but i’ve talked with our counterparts in the u.s. and mexico and everyone is getting prepared for an early renegotiation of the usmca,” darby said.
“of course, mr. trump really liked the usmca when he signed it, but now he doesn’t like it so much. the goalposts keep changing, so we must be ready to figure out those discussions.”
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in the short term, darby said canada has to be prepared to be right back in the crosshairs of trump’s tariff threat by early next month.
darby said we can start by addressing the issues we have control of ourselves.
challenges such as eliminating inter-provincial trade barriers, reducing regulatory burdens, incentivizing investment and productivity. he noted these types of internal issues are limiting our ability to diversify the composition of our trading relationships.
“we’re not going to suddenly solve 100 years of inter-provincial barriers or 20 years of declining manufacturing and investment and complicated regulatory processes, which has prevented us from building everything from mines to pipelines, in four weeks,” darby said.
“at least have those conversations between governments to start moving in the right direction because it’s very likely we will face new tariffs.
“we need to start looking at new ways to become more efficient and also look at other markets.”
darby said the challenge in changing the composition of canada’s trade relationships is the country is oriented in doing everything north-south. building better east-west transportation corridors will be vital to any economic diversification.
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“that’s not easy because for 50 years we’ve been built on north-south infrastructure that allows goods, cars and parts to pass through a border like it wasn’t really there,” darby said.
“yes, (canadian) companies are saying how can i diversify my market, but that’s a longer game. if you’re in the auto parts, chemicals or plastics business, getting the product to europe or asia is not as easy as driving down interstate 75.
“the challenge for canada is are we efficient in moving stuff across the country and do our ports have the capacity in order to start moving goods to other markets.”
closer to home, darby said canada needs to engage in more trade with its other usmca partner mexico. the third member of the north american trading alliance is growing into a manufacturing powerhouse.
darby said trump’s tariff threats have also confirmed some uncomfortable truths for canada. it’s taken a potential economic crisis to generate the political will and motivation to address our over dependance on u.s. trade and productivity and regulatory issues.
“the things this tariff threat sort of exacerbated is canada’s manufacturing sector, while it’s been growing and hiring up until the threat of tariffs, it highlighted the fact we can’t deal with such a large cost increase potentially,” darby said.
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“there’s nothing like a big threat to make us say, ‘hey what a second.’ we’ve been following the u.s. so long in terms of their great economic output.”
dwaddell@postmedia.com
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