Report sets out seven moves, from a competitiveness test to a $300 billion non-US export goal
The share of Canadian exports shipped to the United States fell to 66 percent in July, down from recent levels of roughly 75 percent and the lowest reading since 1997 outside the pandemic.
A Public Policy Forum (PPF) report by Steve Verheul, Canada's former chief negotiator for the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement (CUSMA) and the Canada-European Union Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), put imports from the US at 59 percent of Canada's total.
That share, set out in From Reliance to Resilience, marks a slight decline from recent levels.
Verheul, a PPF fellow, said Canada "cannot diversify by signing agreements and hoping commercial activity follows."
In the report's release, he called for the infrastructure, investment capacity, and commercial strategy needed to turn market access into exports, investment, and jobs.
Foreign direct investment into Canada rose to $100bn in 2025, its highest level in a decade, the PPF report notes, citing a recent RBC report that identifies oil and gas, metals and minerals, electricity, agriculture and food processing, defence, and space as the export-oriented sectors with the greatest growth opportunities.
The federal Canada Strong Fund carries a commitment to catalyze $1tn in new investment across Canada over the next five years, the report states, alongside an investment summit in Toronto on September 14 and 15.
Ottawa has set a goal of doubling non-US exports over the next decade by generating $300bn more in trade, per the report, which also points to a new Strategic Exports Office at Global Affairs Canada created to coordinate engagement across federal departments.
Existing agreements remain under-used.
Global Affairs Canada reports that only 60 percent of the potential value in Canada's trade deal with the EU is being harnessed.
Canada is the only G7 country with trade agreements already in place with all other G7 countries, plus 15 further agreements involving 51 countries, and negotiators have engaged six additional trading partners covering 18 countries.
The report identifies the tightening relationship between the EU and the 12 parties to the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), a group that includes Canada, as one particularly promising opportunity.
Those two blocs together account for more than 30 percent of world trade, more than twice the share involving the US.
The report sets out seven recommendations.
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Unlock investment capital for major projects
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Build a national trade-enabling infrastructure strategy
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Apply a competitiveness test to major tax, regulatory, and policy decisions affecting export-oriented sectors
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Run a two-track strategy covering US access and global diversification
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Convert trade agreements into private-sector deal flow
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Pursue targeted sectoral agreements alongside comprehensive free trade agreements
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Establish an economic security framework covering unfair trade practices, coercive action, and dependence on unreliable suppliers
Diversification will involve difficult choices, Verheul writes, with a stronger emphasis on natural resource exports and smaller volumes of manufactured goods in the initial stages.
Some vehicles cross the Canada-US border as many as eight times before final assembly, the report notes, and Canada's auto manufacturing industry faces fundamental ongoing challenges if Canadian partners are expected to serve simply as suppliers to US firms.
On CUSMA, the report states: "We need to ensure that any 'Fortress North America' doesn't become more effective at locking Canada in than in locking other competitors out."
Verheul said trade diversification "is not a quick pivot away from the United States. It is a long-term effort to make Canada more competitive, more resilient and better able to protect its economic interests in a much less predictable world."
