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International Regulatory Cooperation
Canada is a mid-sized country that is increasingly dependent
on trade, foreign investment and open markets. Canada's
economy is dominated by the Canada-US relationship: Approximately
US $ 1.3 billion worth of goods and services move between Canada
and the United States in 200,000 border crossings every day, with
over 80% of Canadian exports going to the United States. The
regulatory environment is a key factor in creating a climate
conducive to enabling Canadian business activity, attracting
investments to Canada, and facilitating North American and global
trade. Because an economic space is defined and must be supported
by a regulatory space, the quality and effectiveness of
Canada's regulatory system have significant implications
for our economic competitiveness.
At the same time, the protection of health, safety and the
environment is a key objective of regulation. The choice of
regulation contributes to the determination of the level of
social protection. In particular, Canada must have the capacity
to protect citizens in an environment that is driven by
increasingly knowledge-driven and integrated regional and global
economies, free movement of goods, rapid exchange and
marketization of ideas, and a demand for regulatory innovation.
In such a fast-changing context, countries are deemed to
cooperate more, and Canada will need to participate
internationally to stay abreast of rapidly changing knowledge and
technological advancement and to translate these developments
into effective regulatory solutions in all areas.
Areas for discussion:
The following are three areas of inquiry relating to
international regulatory cooperation in which the Committee is
interested and with respect to which it welcomes input:
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Under what circumstances (eg. with whom, on what, when
etc.) can Canada best pursue its national interests (eg.
economic, environmental, social) by engaging in bilateral or
multilateral regulatory cooperation? How can Canada remove
regulatory impediments to the flow of international commerce,
ideas and people, while retaining sufficient flexibility in key policy areas?
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Under what circumstances and criteria should Canada rely
on regulatory thresholds or standards developed by other
countries or international-organizations? Under what
circumstances are Canadian values and interests best protected
through independent, domestic regulatory solutions?
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How can Canada improve its regulatory relationship with
the United States? What impact will alignment with the US have on
Canadian flexibility to work with other trading partners (eg. EU,
Japan, China), or international organizations (eg. Codex, WTO,
WHO)?
Resources
Background Material
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