What's at stake for Hamilton as U.S. moves to renegotiate NAFTA?
A trade deal taken for granted is now top of mind for the Chamber of Commerce
What's at stake for Hamilton as U.S. President Donald Trump said Thursday he wants to renegotiate NAFTA?
Not even the local chamber of commerce knows exactly.
Most chambers and business groups in the province "were not actively thinking about Canada-U.S. trade," said Huzaifa Saeed, the policy and research analyst for the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce.
NAFTA came into effect in 1994. "It almost became a given," Saeed said.
Now the Hamilton chamber, along with its counterparts in Windsor-Essex and Sault Ste. Marie, have launched a survey to companies in the steel food chain – in part, to get a handle on the places where their long-term health is contingent on Canada-U.S. trade arrangements.
The chamber will be presenting to the Steel Caucus in Ottawa next week. Federal representatives from steelmaking cities, including Hamilton, plan to visit counterparts in Washington, D.C. this summer on a trade mission.
The news that NAFTA will be reopened, on top of the buy-America policies touted by Trump's administration, underscored the need for the survey, Saeed said.
"What will be happening throughout this process will be horse-trading," Saeed said. "Some industries get concessions and other industries get stuff taken away from them."
The earliest Canadian negotiators could be sitting down to open talks on NAFTA with their counterparts in the U.S. and Mexico is mid-August. And the letter issued Thursday did not include specifics about what the negotiations would include.
'Ontario's interests front and centre'
Both provincial and federal leaders have said they welcome the opportunity to renegotiate, especially around environmental and workforce issues.
Ontario relies heavily on U.S. trade. Premier Kathleen Wynne said Thursday she is working to make sure "Ontario's interests are front and centre" as federal leaders meet and talk with the U.S.
"We believe that there is nothing inevitable about any of these proposals, and so we are going to continue to be on the ground, working with governors, with legislators in states across the country to make the case that open trade, open borders, are in the best interest of the people of the United States and in the best interests of the people of Canada," Premier Kathleen Wynne told reporters earlier this month.
In Hamilton, steel is the biggest and most obvious sector to consider the impacts for. The heavyweight companies ArcelorMittal Dofasco and Stelco have deep relationships with other entities in Canada and the U.S. for obtaining iron ore and coal and for selling off recycled steel.
But quantifying exactly how the steel industry could be affected by Trump's "buy American, hire American" mantra, and any accompanying change in NAFTA, isn't something local business leaders have off the top of their head.
"We were not considering that we would have to go and within the next 90 days have a huge look at the very fundamentals of Canadian trade," Saeed said.
'I just don't think we should be panicking'
Marvin Ryder, a McMaster University business professor, said Trump's tendency toward "broad and bombastic terms" and accompanying lack of detail means Canada and Hamilton doesn't need to scramble.
"This will take months" even to get started, he said. "I just don't think we should be panicking."
Though much of the attention on the relationship with the U.S. is about dairy and softwood lumber, the auto sector and steel-making will almost certainly get some attention also.
Companies that manufacture engines, pistons, other car parts may be affected if there's a percentage change in the requirements for where those parts must be manufactured.
A growing "agri-food" sector that has taken root at Hamilton's port could be affected if there are tariffs added to exports of grains and soybeans.
