International Trade committee  Actually, not to defer to Corinne, but I think that CFIB might be in a better position to give you a more substantive answer on that one. From Canada's perspective, our members—for the most part, we're talking about business people travelling, and visas and that sort of thing....

International Trade committee  Quite frankly I don't have anything to add to that other than the fact that in recent times we've seen television ads specifically by EDC that speak directly to this issue. So kudos to EDC for putting out those television ads that point to the smallest of Canadian companies and point out to them that they're not too small to export and that they really should be thinking about it.

International Trade committee  As Corinne and I look at each other and smile, I know there is a time limit on these things, so I'll just—

International Trade committee  Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee, and thank you very much for giving me and my members the opportunity to have input on this very important topic. My name is Joy Nott, and I'm the president and CEO of the Canadian Association of Importers and Exporters, otherwise known as I.E.

International Trade committee  I would echo everything that Jay just said and provide you with one example. There's a Canadian company that for over 50 years imported musical instruments from Asia, primarily China, into Canada and had their North American distribution hub based just outside of Toronto, in Scarborough.

International Trade committee  As far as where the trade commissioner service offices currently are globally, I think they are aligned. I think the more pressing issue relative to the trade commissioner service is the fact that—and I'm pretty well known for saying this—it's Canada's best kept secret. The number of SMEs I have talked to that have never heard of the trade commissioner service, misunderstand what it is, and/or think they themselves are not big enough or important enough to use it, to me is problematic.

International Trade committee  I think out of those three markets the one that is the most attractive, at least from the feedback from my members, is the established markets that we already have with the broad interest across all industry sectors. Of course, the second most popular, or the one that people seem to be seeing as having the most opportunity, are very specific industry sectors and emerging markets that are very focused on a specific industry sector.

International Trade committee  I'm not exactly sure what your question is, but would it help the overall situation that I was talking about before, an import policy? There are two aspects to trade. There is the aspect of trade that is the actual physical movement of goods. That's the box at the border, the box on trucks and airplanes that we think about.

International Trade committee  I was just going to say very quickly that something CME is actually championing right now is something called ECN, the enterprise Canada network. It's a website with the idea that small companies and large companies are going to be able to go to this website and find potential partners in foreign settings.

International Trade committee  The enterprise Canada network, ECN, and CME is actually championing it.

International Trade committee  Sure, I completely agree and understand what it is that you're saying with regard to FTAs that we're currently negotiating and the ones that we've signed. I.E. Canada has testified many times before this committee and various Senate committees to say that we support free trade overall.

International Trade committee  Sure. Whether or not we need to be doing more for SMEs to actually help them to survive and thrive, relative to some of the statements that Jayson Myers made earlier, I think SMEs, for the most part—at least the SMEs that I'm familiar with, that I've talked to—come from one of two schools: either they're very much a global thinker and they have the leadership courage to take their companies into different markets, or they come from the opposite school, where they are very intimidated by rules and regulations that seem to be highly complex, that they don't understand.

International Trade committee  Yes, I can hear you.

International Trade committee  Thank you. My name is Joy Nott, and I'm the president of the Canadian Association of Importers and Exporters. Jay and I always joke about the fact that one of the most common questions I'm asked is what the difference is between I.E. Canada and CME. Probably the main difference is the fact that Jay represents manufacturers, I represent importers, and we both represent exporters.

International Trade committee  Yes, I can.