Canada PM Carney to visit China to talk trade with Xi as US tariffs hit growth
Sign up now: Get insights on Asia's fast-moving developments
Since taking power last March, Canadian PM Mark Carney has steadily sought to lower tensions with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Follow topic:
OTTAWA - Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney will make an official visit to China next week as his government tries to rebuild relations with the Asian superpower and reduce Canada’s economic reliance on the US.
Mr Carney is set to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping during the visit and will have discussions on trade, energy, agriculture and international security, his office said on Jan 7.
It will be the first trip to China by a Canadian prime minister in nearly a decade, after a diplomatic row was sparked by Canada’s 2018 arrest of Huawei Technologies Co executive Meng Wanzhou
Shortly after, China detained two Canadians
More recently, Canada and China have slapped tariffs on each other’s exports.
In 2024, Canada hiked import taxes on Chinese electric vehicles, steel and aluminium, in part to align its trade policies with the US.
China retaliated by hitting Canadian agricultural products with new duties, including on canola, a key crop that’s also known as rapeseed.
Mr Carney took further measures to curb steel shipments from China and other nations in 2025 after the White House put a 50 per cent tax on foreign steel
The tit-for-tat tariffs with China have caused internal tensions in Canada, with some political leaders in the western prairie provinces accusing the federal government of sacrificing canola exports to protect the auto and steel industries based in the industrial belt of Ontario.
China is Canada’s second-largest trading partner after the US, with total merchandise trade of C$118 billion (S$109.55 billion) in 2024, according to Canadian government data.
US President Donald Trump’s tariffs, especially those on steel, aluminium, autos and lumber, have sparked a sense of urgency in Canada to diversify trade away from the US.
Mr Carney has set a goal of doubling his country’s non-US exports over the next decade.
Since taking power last March
In October, the two leaders held a formal meeting
Mr Carney called it “a turning point in the relationship” and accepted an invitation from Mr Xi to visit.
Canadian government officials and politicians have travelled to China over the past few months to prepare the ground for Mr Carney’s trip.
Mr Carney has said he sees opportunities to boost agricultural and energy trade with China.
The expanded Trans Mountain pipeline to Canada’s west coast has already enabled record oil exports to China, and Mr Carney is clearing regulatory hurdles to allow a potential new pipeline to be built.
Mr Trump’s intervention in Venezuela
Deep freeze
Former Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau made two visits to China, in 2016 and 2017, as he flirted with negotiating a trade deal.
But that pact never materialised and relations went into a deep freeze after Ms Meng’s arrest.
Near the end of Mr Trudeau’s tenure, his government remained on hostile footing with China.
In 2022, then-Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly published an Indo-Pacific strategy that labelled China an “increasingly disruptive” force in the world and sought to increase Canada’s trade with other democratic countries in the region.
A year later, Mr Trudeau’s government called a judicial inquiry into allegations of Chinese meddling
The inquiry concluded that while China and other countries did attempt to interfere, the overall results of recent elections weren’t affected.
Mr Carney has steered Canada onto a different path with China.
“We’re starting from a very low base and we can move quite substantially before we start to get to sensitive areas,” he said after his meeting with Mr Xi in October.
While no tariffs were lifted after that meeting, Mr Carney said it was the first step toward a broader discussion about deepening bilateral ties.
“People sometimes simplify it down, to give this for that,” he told reporters at the time. “That’s not the way it works.”
Mr Carney said he has a longer-term goal of opening up “a much bigger set of opportunities for a broader range of Canadian businesses” in China, and cited Canadian retailers such as Lululemon Athletica Inc or Canada Goose Holdings Inc as examples of companies that could benefit.
He said the two sides were also aiming to roll back travel restrictions on each other’s citizens.
In November, China announced it would resume allowing group tourism to Canada after having halted it in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. BLOOMBERG
