Canada suggests to integrate steel industries with the US
Canadian trade minister Pierre Pettigrew brought forth his suggestion of integrating the steel industries of Canada and the United States, defending that sauch action would bring a new dimension to the trade in North American region. Basically, the idea is to create a common North American steel industry, by the US and Canada getting together for the purpose of creating a single steel market for the continent under the North American Free Trade Agreement. Uniting the steel industries carries the intention of avoiding implementation of duties arising from trading disputes. Both countries will start examining the situation to find out any possibilities of such action. They are even discussing to create a customs union on steel under NAFTA agreement. The discussion between officials of two countries are expected to continue this week, however all remain unofficial information for the time being. Under such agreement, both countries would agree on a same external tariff level to avoid or limit implementation of anti-dumping or countervailing duties in trade disputes, and starting from steel industries, they are willing to create open markets through integration in other sectors as well. The benefit of such agreement for Canada would be working without the threat of market disruption, according to industry experts. Therefore such opinion finds back up from the industry players. This could work for the US steel users in Canada at most. And such agreement would provide steel companies having facilities around all the NAFTA countries, freeing them from all trade barriers would help them enhance their business.