There has been quite a bit of buzz recently about the possibility of shipping Canada’s western oil to China. Could this opportunity pave the way for a future Canada-China free trade agreement?
According to a recent interview with CBC Radio’s The House, Harper was asked about China’s Premier Wen Jiabao’s suggestion that Canada and China should reach a full-out free trade agreement.
To follow is an excerpt of Stephen Harper’s response:
“Well look, we’ve concluded the foreign investment promotion and protection agreement. This is the first major economy wide agreement between our two countries. We’ve committed to complete the joint complementary study this spring and that will lead us to discussions to examine the feasibility and some of the potentials of a free trade agreement. That’s still many steps from actually reaching a free trade agreement. We’re not under any illusion there would be some significant obstacles. But this government’s agenda is to diversify our trade. We’ve got discussions going with the European Union, with India, we’re trying to get full membership in the Trans-Pacific Partnership and we’re also talking with some other key partners in Asia, like the Japanese and the South Koreans. So my view is we get as many irons in the fire as we can and we see how far we can take it. But there will be enormous opportunity in China if we could ever get to that stage but at the same time [we’re] not under any illusions that there would be a significant number of economic and other questions that would have to be answered.”