Launched on October 1, 2014, the Commerce 3.0 – Canada report shows that the Canadian government can help drive export activity amongst a growing number of Canadian small businesses by removing barriers to the free flow of goods across the country’s borders. The report suggests that this can be accomplished by raising the import duty exemption threshold from C$20 to C$200. Additional report highlights include:
- 99.5% of tech-enabled Canadian businesses export as compared to only 10.4% of traditional brick-and-mortar businesses
- 57% of traditional Canadian exporters trade only with the U.S. which the companies in this study trade with an average of 19 countries
- 14% increase in cross-border sales from 2008-2013 for technology-enabled Canadian businesses
- 26% of SME’s engaged in international trade significantly outperform their market versus only 13% of SME’s who are solely focused on domestic selling
In addition to import duty exemption threshold recommendations, the report makes additional policy recommendations aimed at simplifying customs processes for small, technology-enabled businesses.