Trade between New York and the Canadian province of Quebec is crucial to the Empire State. For example, Quebec exports more than $6 billion in goods to New York, and in Clinton County alone more than 180 Quebec-based companies have a presence.
Quebec Delegate General in New York Jean-Claude Lauzon, the province’s top diplomat in the United States, recently visited some of the Quebec-based businesses operating in the Plattsburgh area and met with regional officials. Lauzon also spent some time discussing the impacts of federally imposed tariffs and NAFTA renegotiations on cross-border trade.“The tariffs we try to understand why the administration imposed those tariffs. And those tariffs are based on the fact that some countries in the world, and you can appreciate who they are, are basically dumping their overcapacity to United States and Canada not only to United States but to our country as well so we’re facing the same problem. And we don’t think that by imposing tariffs on Canada, which is your biggest ally in the world, will resolve the issue with those other countries. We understand the national security issue. We don’t think we are a threat to the United States in fact we’re fighting wars together as we speak. But somehow the administration has not didn’t want to hear that initially and they imposed tariffs on Canada of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum. This is at the end of the day going to impact the American consumer and of course the Canadian consumer because someone will have to pay for those tariffs.”
An extended conversation with Quebec Delegate General in New York Jean-Claude Lauzon is below.
