Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement

The Free Trade Agreement (FTA) (French: Accord du libre-échange (ALE)) was a trade agreement signed by Canada and the United States on October 4, 1988. The agreement, finalized by October 1987, removed several trade restrictions in stages over a ten year period, and resulted in a great increase in cross-border trade. With the addition of Mexico in 1994 FTA was superseded by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) (French: Accord du libre-échange Nord Américain (ALENA), Spanish:Tratado de Libre Comercio de América del Norte (TLCAN)).

As stated in the agreement, the main purposes of the Canadian-United States Free Trade Agreement were:

• eliminate barriers to trade in goods and services between Canada and the United States;
• facilitate conditions of fair competition within the free-trade area established by the Agreement;
• significantly liberalize conditions for investment within that free-trade area;
• establish effective procedures for the joint administration of the Agreement and the resolution of disputes;
• lay the foundation for further bilateral and multilateral cooperation to expand and enhance the benefits of the Agreement.

History

Starting in 1855, while Canada was under British control, free trade was implemented between the colonies of British North America and the United States under the Reciprocity Treaty. In 1866, a year before Canadian Confederation, the United States Congress voted to cancel the treaty.

Free trade with the U.S. has long been a controversial issue in Canada. Historically, Canadians who advocated a closer relationship with the U.S., especially closer economic ties, were portrayed by critics as encouraging political annexation by the United States. Under Canada's first Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald, the protectionist National Policy became a cornerstone of the new Canadian nation's policies toward the United States.

The Liberal Party of Canada had traditionally supported free trade. Free trade in natural products was a central issue in the 1911 Canadian federal election. The Conservative Party campaigned using fiery anti-American rhetoric, and the Liberals lost the election. The issue of free trade did not rise to this level of national prominence in Canada again for many decades.

From 1935-1980, the two nations entered a number of bilateral trade agreements that greatly reduced tariffs in both nations. The most significant of these agreements was the 1960s Automotive Products Trade Agreement (also known as the Auto Pact).

Negotiation

By the early 1980s Canada and the US were very interested in an agreement. It got off the ground quickly. Brian Mulroney's Progressive Conservative Party was elected to office in the 1984 election. Free trade was not an important issue in the election, but Mulroney and the party both announced their opposition to such a move. In 1985, a Royal Commission on the economy issued a report to the Government of Canada recommending free trade with the US.

This commission was chaired by former Liberal Minister of Finance Donald S. Macdonald and had been commissioned by the Liberal government of Pierre Trudeau. Mulroney nonetheless embraced the report's findings. US President Ronald Reagan welcomed the Canadian initiative and the United States Congress gave the President the authority to sign a free trade agreement with Canada, subject to it being presented for Congressional review by October 5, 1987. In May 1986, Canadian and American negotiators began to work out a trade deal. The Canadian team was led by former deputy Minister of Finance Simon Reisman and the American side by Peter O. Murphy, the former deputy United States trade representative in Geneva.

The agreement between the two countries ultimately created greatly liberalized trade between them, removing most remaining tariffs, but tarriffs were only a minor part of the FTA. Average tariffs on goods crossing the border were well below 1% by the 1980s. Instead, Canada desired unhindered access to the American economy. Americans, in turn, wished to have access to Canada's energy and cultural industries.

In the negotiations, Canada retained the right to protect its cultural industries and such sectors as education and health care. As well, some resources such as water were left out of the agreement. The Canadians did not succeed in winning free competition for American government procurement contracts.

Debate and implementation

The debate in Canada over whether to implement the negotiated agreement was very contentious. The opposition Liberal Party of Canada under leader John Turner vociferously opposed the agreement, saying that he would "tear it up" if he became prime minister. The opposition New Democratic Party under leader Ed Broadbent also strongly opposed the agreement. Both parties objected that the agreement would erode Canadian sovereignty, arguing that Canada would effectively become the "51st state" of the US if the agreement was implemented. They also raised concerns about how Canada's social programs and other trade agreements such as the Auto Pact would be affected.

The legislation to implement the agreement was delayed in the Senate, which had a Liberal Party majority. Partly in response to these delays, Mulroney called an election in 1988. Trade Agreement was by far the most prominent issue of the campaign, prompting some to call it the "Free Trade Election." It was the first Canadian election to feature large third-party campaign advertising, with supporters and opponents using lobbyists to buy television advertisements.

It was also the first Canadian election to use much negative advertising; one anti-free-trade advertisement showed negotiators "removing a line" from the Free Trade Agreement, which at the end of the advertisement was revealed to be the Canada-U.S. border. Although some opinion polls showed slightly more Canadians against the Agreement than in favour of it, Mulroney's Progressive Conservatives benefited from being the only party in favour of the agreement, while the Liberals and NDP split the anti-free trade vote. Mulroney won a governing majority and the agreement was passed into law even if a majority of thje voters had voted for parties opposing free trade.

The Free Trade Agreement faced much less opposition in the US. Polls showed that up to 40% of Americans were unaware that the agreement had been signed. The treaty was given to the Congress for "fast-track" ratification by President Reagan, meaning that it could be accepted or rejected but could not be amended. It passed the House and Senate on 9 September 1988 by comfortable margins.

Effects

The exact ramifications of the agreement are hard to measure. After the agreement came into effect, trade between Canada and the U.S. began to increase rapidly. While throughout the 20th century, exports fairly consistently made up about 25% of Canada's gross domestic product (GDP), since 1990 exports have been about 40% of GDP. After 2000, they reached nearly 50%.

Conservative economists welcomed the Free Trade Agreement, focusing on the gains from trade, while liberal economists criticized the agreement as a cause of capital flight and job insecurity due to international outsourcing.

Often, analyses of the free trade agreement find that its effects on the two countries depend on the difference in value between the Canadian dollar and the US dollar. In 1990-1991, the Canadian dollar rose sharply in value against the US dollar, making Canadian manufactured goods much more expensive for Americans to buy and making American manufactured goods much cheaper for Canadians, who no longer had to pay high duties on them.

The phenomenon of "cross-border shopping," where Canadians would make shopping daytrips to US border towns to take advantage of tariff-free goods and a high Canadian dollar, provided a mini-boom for these towns. The loss of many Canadian jobs, particularly in the Ontario manufacturing sector during the recession of the early 1990s, was attributed (fairly or not) to the Free Trade Agreement.

In the mid-to-late 1990s, however, the Canadian dollar fell to record lows in value to against the US dollar. Cheaper Canadian primary products such as lumber and oil could be bought tariff-free by Americans, and Hollywood studios sent their crews to film many movies in Canada due to the cheap Canadian dollar. The removal of protective tariffs meant that market forces, such as currency values, have a greater effect on the economies of both countries that they would have with tarriffs.

The agreement has failed to liberalize trade in some areas, most notably softwood lumber, in which Canadians expressed frustration and believed that Americans repeatedly violated the agreement to impose protectionist policies.

The policies still remain incredibly pro-American, and Canada's natural resources are extremely abundant when compared to the United States. Issues such as mineral, fresh water, and softwood lumber trade still remain disputed.

While the agreement remains controversial to this day, it is no longer at the forefront of Canadian politics. It was superseded by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in 1994. The Liberals under Jean Chrétien were elected to office in the 1993 election, partly on a promise to renegotiate key labor and environmental parts of NAFTA. An agreement was indeed struck with the Democrats under Bill Clinton that created separate side deals to address both of these concerns. The Liberal Party of Canada is largely content with the existing agreement.

Today, the NDP still argues that the FTA and its successor, NAFTA, do not, amongst other concerns, provide adequate measures to protect the labor force and to prevent big business from degrading the environment. They have since taken the view that the two NAFTA side agreements negotiated by Chrétien and Clinton should be worked into the main body of the agreement so that they can be properly enforced, which is notably the same position that US President Barack Obama has recently taken. It is unclear whether or not either of the other two major Canadian political parties would be interested in opening the agreement back up to address these concerns, but current Prime Minister Stephen Harper has recently expressed his lack of interest in doing so.

References

• Wilkinson, Bruce. "Free Trade." The Canadian Encyclopedia

External links

• CBC Digital Archives - Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement
• Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act
• Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement: Eliminating Barriers to Trade