It came as no small shock last week when China announced a ban on all Canadian exports of canola seed, cutting off what is indisputably the most important international market for Alberta producers.
In 2018, Canadian producers shipped approximately $2.7 billion in canola to China. Alberta producers alone sent about $800 million in canola to China, making them our largest trading partner.
But now that relationship has ceased, all because Canada followed its obligations under international treaties and detained Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou at the behest of U.S. authorities, who are looking to extradite her on charges that her company violated Iran sanctions.
Oh, that’s not the “official” reason for China’s ban, which was supposedly instituted because of past issues with Canadian canola. But no one with half a brain is buying that rather lame excuse. Our quality standards for exports of any crop are quite high.
No, China is attempting to either punish Canada for Wanzhou’s arrest or pressure us into letting her go. They’ve even detained Canadian citizens and accused them of espionage as a means of applying further pressure.
Some might argue that we never should have gotten involved and that we should have refused the U.S. government’s request.
But we were only doing what we were legally obligated to do. If we don’t meet our end of extradition treaties, then Canadian criminals could easily escape justice by fleeing to another country.
We weren’t in the wrong here. Of course, try telling that to the Chinese government.
One could argue that they should direct all of their ire at the U.S., but China is already embroiled in a trade war with our southern neighbours, and there’s little more they can do to strike at America. It’s far easier to strike at us.
So what’s to be done to rectify this situation? Sadly, nothing. We have to leave it to our diplomats to try and work things out. Hopefully, they can convince Chinese officials that this trading partnership was mutually beneficial.
That said, it’s unlikely China will relent on the canola ban soon. If anything, they’re likely to double down, seeking other avenues to strike at us. Any Canadian who does business with China should be considering whether their revenue stream is about to dry up.
There is one silver lining here, albeit not much of one - we’re lucky this ban was announced now before spring seeding really got underway.
Canola producers in the Barrhead area and elsewhere can perhaps make some last-minute adjustments to the number of acres they planned to dedicate to canola.
Hopefully, farmers can weather this. Hardly anyone could deny that they haven’t been through worse.
