2w ago

Canadian governments want you to buy local. Can they practise what they preach?

theijf.org Canadian governments want you to buy local. Can they practise what they preach?

Canadian governments award billions to American companies. Stopping might not be easy

Politicians across the country have urged Canadians to buy local amid the ongoing threat of a trade war with the United States — something many consumers are already doing.

But for governments themselves, that might be easier said than done.

An IJF analysis has found a quarter of the top 100 suppliers to the federal government in terms of total contract value are headquartered in the United States, three times more than any other foreign country.

. . .

Those 100 contractors — two of which are departments of the U.S. government itself — have been awarded more than $62.5 billion in government business since 2014, the IJF analysis found. That’s compared to about $131 billion for the 57 Canada-based companies that appear in the top 100.

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8 comments

Well canada is just 3 companies in a trench coat, how about we get some competition going here? break up telecoms and groceries and crash the housing market then we'll START the conversation.
- Yup...so sick of the bullshit.

This isn’t the major issue it’s being portrayed as.
Under Canada’s free trade agreements—including those with the WTO, CPTPP, and the European Union—Canada is obligated to allow foreign companies from these partner regions to compete for large government procurement contracts (typically valued at ~$230,000 CAD or more). These agreements ensure fair access without protectionist barriers and, in return, give Canadian companies access to similar opportunities in those markets.
Given this context, it's not surprising that a significant portion of federal procurement contracts go to companies headquartered in the world's largest free market economy, the United States. The fact that nearly 25% of federal government suppliers by total contract value being U.S.-based is not unexpected under these trade arrangements.

Just imagine a GOC that doesn't use US software... 3/4 of them can't even use OneDrive or their OpenText IM
- Would be nice to see a government wide move away from windows and Microsoft products in general.

That site seems to be resistant to archivers/paywall removers.
- Shit, sorry. Archive.today was still cooking when I posted it. I tried a bunch of different archives and couldn't get anything to work either.
  
  Yeah no worries, when I saw yours didn't work I tried a bunch of others too, with no luck

8 comments