Water Haller: Eau Canada

I loved Prime Minister Chretien’s joke earlier this year that Mr. Trump deserves the Order of Canada—because no one has done more to unite Canada than he has!

 

The impact of the tariffs, or the threat of tariffs (or even annexation), has caused a lot of reaction in our water world. For decades, we have developed an integrated Canada/US industry, where equipment and supplies flow back and forth across the border, like automobiles.  With everything changing weekly, it has been hard to determine what items are effected, which are covered by the CUSMA Treaty and if the treaty is even respected anymore. Our member municipalities have been making new policies to buy Canadian and minimize any US spending.

 

At one point, we at CWWA, were discussing the idea of creating a Directory of Canadian Products.  But very quickly, this well-meaning concept seemed to be harder to achieve, if not impossible.  Like I said above, our industry is so integrated with the USA.  Like auto parts, our equipment can go back and forth a few times.  What makes a product Canadian?  What percentage of the product is Canadian?  What about ownership?  What if the company is based in Canada with Canadian employees, but owned by a global company based in the US?  Who is going to verify that a company is Canadian?  I quickly learned this was a more difficult task than first thought.

 

But now Prime Minister Carney and the federal government have vowed to initiate a “Buy Canadian” campaign.  They have committed that federal procurement and funds will be targeted within Canada, with Canadian suppliers.  Our American friends can’t be upset as they have promoted a “Buy America” effort for many years.  So the onus to determine “what is Canadian” falls to the federal or provincial governments…or to each of our municipalities that must make some type of scoring system.

 

We would like to share this type of information amongst our members.  So if you have a well written procurement policy addressing this situation, or have created a formula to determine “Canadianism”, we’d love to see it, and share it.

 

 

Speaking of being pro-Canadian…Do the Canadian thing and attend the National Water & Wastewater Conference in Victoria this November.  Don’t lose your conference budget that you didn’t spend on ACE or WEFTEC and try Canada’s water management conference this year.  Looking at registration, this is already breaking records for us as our biggest event ever!  With the number of excellent papers submitted, we had to expand the program from five simultaneous sessions to six.  We have sold out an expanded marketplace (exhibitor hall).

 

Of course, we are planning another memorable Celebration event with a 1940’s Big Band era swing band and swing dancers – obviously, Victoria is for swingers! (wink)

I do hope to see my fellow Canadians in November!