Comments by Premier David Eby today should give a boost to the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce in its fight to make headway against interprovincial trade barriers.
During a news conference on the looming tariff threat from U.S. President Donald Trump, Eby mentioned that now is the time to address interprovincial trade barriers.
“It’s moments like these when we realize that it’s easier to trade with Washington State than it is to trade with Ontario for key products that the message really hits home.
“If we’re going to respond to these tariffs. If we’re going to be successful in this tariff battle, we’ve got to buy each other’s stuff across Canada. We’ve got to buy Canadian first. We’ve got to take our own advice,” said the premier.
The Kelowna Chamber recently had one of its policy proposals ‘Interprovincial Trade Barriers Need to Fall” adopted at the Canadian Chamber of Commerce.
“This is the moment to move,” said Candace Laing, president & CEO of the Canadian Chamber, on a call to the national Chamber network on January 27. “The provincial premiers are meeting now to figure out how to drop these barriers and adding rather than subtracting from Canada’s GDP growth.”
Research by the Kelowna Chamber suggests that the growth in GDP could be as much as $200 billion over the next decade if interprovincial trade barriers on labour, lumber, liquor and many more products and services are removed.
It sounds like Eby is making strides on wine.
“We’ve had a lot of discussions with Ontario about wine – being able to ship BC wine direct-to-consumer in Ontario, just like we do in Alberta now. And I’m sure they have their own priorities with us. Things that we do that they find frustrating,” said Eby.
“These are the moments where we can expand markets across Canada. We can trade and build up our country. We’re all going to have to take a haircut in terms of those political priorities, but the net effect will be increased prosperity and wealth across the country.”
