Canadian Fur -- A nation built on pelts, NationalPost, Jun 25, 2013
...How much would you pay, say, for a dead Canadian polar bear? And not to wear, but to make into a rug or put on a pedestal -- a stuffed bear for one and all to see? A thousand bucks? Two? Five? Try $22,000. Of all the crazy things in the great Canadian fur boom the polar bear (Ursus maritimus) has gone the craziest, selling for world record prices and ending up in Chinese mansions and shopping malls. Oh: and the $22,000 is only for the skin, the finished rug will run you about $80,000...

Canada's fur trade is booming again -- thanks to demand from [communist] China's new capitalists, NationalPost, Jun 25, 2013
...Eugen is a master taxidermist. He and Edith...own Capilano Furs & Taxidermy Studios in North Vancouver. They have been in business since 1956. "I have a Chinese client looking for two polar bear skins to be stuffed, stitched back together and posed, presumably fiercely, on pedestals for display. "I think we could see a skin sell for $20,000... The Chinese economic tiger's appetite for furry Canadian critters has single-handedly revived an industry that, in the North American and European spheres, was left for road kill more than 20 years ago, done in by shifting consumer tastes and catchy animal rights slogans including, perhaps, the most famous of all: "I'd rather go naked than wear fur". Well, China's new capitalists would rather wear fur than go naked. And that is good news for Canadian trappers, says Mark Downey, CEO of Fur Harvesters, a trapper-owned co-operative that markets North American furs to foreign buyers. "When I started in this business the world's biggest fur fair was in Frankfurt -- and it no longer exists", he says. "Now the biggest is in Hong Kong and the biggest after that is Beijing. "China is driving the market. It is young people with money. They want fancy watches, cars and a Gucci coat -- with a fox fur collar". Or else they want a polar bear.

But let's remember our Canadian history: Before oil made Alberta king, the industrious beaver made Canada a possibility, turning a land of lakes and rivers and emptiness into a resource for European haberdashers hungry for beaver felt -- soft, pliable, perfect for hats. Samuel de Champlain, no less, fought "The Beaver Wars" with the Iroquois in the early 1600s to secure the trade for the French. Then the English fought the French. Even the Dutch wanted a piece of the action that petered out in the 1850s, when silk hats became the rage. Trappers joke that the fur trade is Canada's second-oldest land-based profession. Frank Phillips, a retired conservation officer and trapper in Labrador, can't say how far back his family's fur-trading lineage goes. "It has been passed down through generations", he says....

Steve and Janet Han are a father/daughter team shopping for skins for export to China for manufacture into rugs. (A rug can fetch $80,000; a stuffed bear as much as $100,000.) The Hans are originally from China. Janet, in her 20s, is an engineer. Steve says he is "too busy" with the fur business to do without her help. "A polar bear is a rare thing, like a diamond", Janet says. "That's why people in China want it". They also want it because it might not be available for much longer. Canada narrowly won an international vote in March that, had it lost -- and the Americans and Russians were in opposition -- would have banned the international polar bear trade. The next vote is in 2016. For now, about 600 bears are harvested annually, with about 300 sold at auction. "This is an absolutely fantastic story for native hunters", says Andrew Derocher, a University of Alberta biology professor who has been studying polar bears for 30 years. "Polar bear furs are a treasure and for the most part the harvest, beyond parts of Baffin Bay and Western Hudson Bay, is of no concern...

Chinese main buyers of polar bear fur (pay $20,000 for top notch), CBC, Dec 7, 2015
Canada is the only country in the world that allows commercial trade in polar bears. A researcher found no evidence that growing sales of polar bear furs to China are leading to more hunting or threatening the animals. A new analysis shows Chinese consumers with an appetite for luxury have taken over from American sport hunters as the main buyers of Canadian polar bear fur. But the study to be presented this week at a conference in Vancouver concludes there's no reason to believe that the sale of bear hides or other parts threatens the animal's future. "This increasing Chinese market may have stimulated some increased hunting, but really what it did is stimulate increased exporting", said Ernest Cooper, a consultant who is to present his findings Wednesday at ArcticNet, which brings together Arctic researchers from all fields.... The main market for the hides used to be American sport hunters returning home with their trophies. But after the United States made importing the hides illegal, the trade shifted to China.... "The market for polar bear hides in China reflects an increasing market for all furs going to China", said Cooper....

China trade talks reopen Canada's fascination with the mysterious east, TheStar, Sep 26, 2016
But will free trade with China make us rich? Probably not.... On Thursday the prime minister announced Canada and China have formally agreed to open free trade talks. Many Canadians might be surprised to discover Canada doesn't already have some kind of free trade agreement with China. From electronics to kitchenware, it is hard to find anything for sale that is not made in China. On the other side of the ledger, China already freely buys vast quantities of Canadian raw materials, such as wood pulp and oilseeds. In terms of both imports and exports, China is Canada's number two trading partner. As well, the two countries have signed an agreement to protect each other's corporate investors from unseemly government interference, such as environmental regulations that reduce profitability. This Canada-China Foreign Investment Protection Agreement of 2014 is binding for a minimum of 31 years. What else is there to do? The answer, it seems, is more of the same. As a senior Chinese official told the Globe and Mail newspaper earlier this year, China would like more Canadian raw materials and agricultural products. It wants the rule scrapped that limits the ability of state-owned Chinese companies to buy Canadian energy firms. And it would really like Canada to build a pipeline that would bring Alberta oil to the British Columbia coast, where it could be shipped to China....

China & Canada announce free-trade talks, GlobeMail, Sep 23, 2016
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang ended his visit to Canada with a strong pitch for free trade and closer ties to Canada while skirting the most contentious human-rights and rule-of-law issues still standing in the way of a deep alliance. Mr Li's speech to a Montreal business crowd lauded dozens of bilateral agreements and business announcements that have accompanied his four-day visit to Canada -- the first of its kind by a top Chinese official in six years. Deals were reached on canola and beef trade disputes, on the construction of a nuclear reactor by SNC-Lavalin and a new Montreal-Shanghai route for Air Canada, to name a few examples.... China has no free-trade agreement with any G7 country and only a small number of other developed countries....

Why Canada should avoid free trade with China, by Gwyn Morgan, TimesColonist, Sep 15, 2016
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's trip to China prompted speculation that it was the first step toward a free-trade agreement... But what if one country is a free-market democracy and the other a [communist] aristocracy? What if one has a culture of fair dealing enforced by the rule of law through an independent judiciary, while the other has a judiciary that's an apparatchik of government, often acting as an instrument of repression rather than justice? What if one country respects international intellectual property laws, while the other facilitates industrial espionage and the production of cheap knockoffs? What if one economy is driven by private enterprise, while businesses in the other gain advantage from government loans and subsidies facilitated by corrupt officials? What if one country has a free and open media, while the other blocks international media and has only state-controlled media that publishes only regime-friendly stories? What if one country protects human rights, while the other throws those critics in jail for treason? Finally, what if one country holds industries to strong environmental standards, while citizens in the other choke on smog and drink toxic water? In such circumstances, wouldn't the leader of the first country be extremely unwise to consider entering into free trade with the other?...

And there are even more reasons for Canada to stay away from free trade with the great dragon. What do we have to sell them? Certainly not manufactured goods. There are very few that China can't produce more cheaply. The crux of the Canada-China trade relationship has always been that we send them raw materials and they ship consumer goods back to us. Since natural resources are globally traded commodities that already move tariff-free, free trade would provide absolutely no benefit to resource exporters. On the other hand, removing tariffs on manufactured goods would put our manufacturers at even greater disadvantage.... Then there's the contrast in environmental enforcement. While Beijing touts toughened environmental laws, the truth is a starkly different story. Despite all the rhetoric about renewable energy from Chinese officials at the recent Paris COP21 global warming conference, China operates more than 2,300 coal-fired power plants with almost 1,400 more planned or under construction. That's bad enough, but few of those plants actually meet government emission standards. Cheap power, subsidized manufacturing plants and huge overcapacity. Who can compete with that?...

Canada PM's China trip sparks fears of bad deal for workers (agreement with Australia allows Chinese companies to use their own workers. Is Canada next?)
by Jeremy Nuttall, TheTyee.ca, Aug 29, 2016
As Prime Minister Justin Trudeau makes his first official visit to China, critics fear the government's eagerness to sign a free trade agreement with Beijing could lead to a bad deal for Canadian workers. That's what happened when Australia signed a free trade agreement with China last year, warns Andrew Dettmer, national president of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union. The China-Australia Free Trade Agreement gave Chinese enterprises the right to bring in an unlimited number of workers for major projects, the union says. "An agreement like ChAFTA is a road to ruin for Canadian jobs. It won't provide anything by way of advantage to Canadian industry.".... Canadian business groups and China's government have said they want a deal... The right to bring Chinese workers to Canada is already on Beijing's agenda.... Beijing has been undermining employment in western nations for years through state subsidies, currency manipulation and protectionist trade policies. A deal allowing them to bring in their own workers would be "insane".... "Isn't it bad enough that we have allowed China to get away with all these things that have lead to the offshoring of literally hundreds of thousands of Canadian jobs?".... The issue is "life and death" for the middle class...

Canada PM ready to bolster ties by joining Chinese-led bank, National Post, Aug 31, 2016
Hours after landing in Beijing, Justin Trudeau signalled Canada is ready to take the first step in a promised "reset" of its relationship with its second-largest trading partner by applying for membership in the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, a China-led institution the United States has refused to join. Canadian Finance Minister Bill Morneau is expected to meet Wednesday afternoon with Jin Liqun, the bank's president, in Beijing, at the outset of Mr Trudeau's inaugural trip to China as Prime Minister. "We are looking very favourably at the possibility of joining", Mr Trudeau said Tuesday after arriving in China. The AIIB is China's answer to the USA.-dominated World Bank and the Japan-dominated Asian Development Bank. The new global financial institution is headquartered in Beijing, with China as its largest shareholder. Though it has been built as an international organization -- with Western countries contributing to its governance standards and English as its language of operations -- the bank, in selecting which highways, power plants and railways to fund, gives China new power to exert regional influence. Signing up is a way for Ottawa to curry favour, sending a message that it supports a project central to China's ambitions in challenging the existing world order....

For Mr. Trudeau, the bank decision may be the easiest he makes in China, where soon after his arrival he was confronted by the determination of China's business establishment to focus its immense economic might on Canada. At a meeting with the China Entrepreneur Club, a collection of billionaires led by Alibaba founder Jack Ma, executives peppered the Prime Minister with questions about whether he would welcome their money in sensitive Canadian industries, such as culture and agriculture. The latter came from a company with negotiators currently in Canada trying to buy pig farms. One man even suggested making Chinese an official language in Canada. Do that and "you will certainly be bigger than your father to a lot of Chinese people", the man said, referring to Pierre Trudeau's renown from more than four decades ago, when Ottawa was among the first Western countries to diplomatically recognize Communist China. The Prime Minister demurred. Improve the relationship and there will be more avenues to invest, he said. But he was more interested in selling Canadian food and technology to China.... On Tuesday, Mr. Trudeau pitched Canada as a bridge between China and the world, a bid to take back the role fashioned by his father....

Cat & dog fur from China worn in Canada, GlobeMail, Mar 3, 2016
As the last few weeks of winter bears down on us, armies of urbanites clad in fur-trimmed parkas march the streets. But do they know what animal died for their fur trim? Canadians who wear fur -- or fur-trimmed mittens or hoods -- may be surprised to learn that cat and dog fur is perfectly legal; many are wearing dog or cat without even knowing it. There's no requirement that fur products be labelled, and consumers often have no idea which species they're wearing. This may finally be about to change: Rookie Liberal MP Nathaniel Erskine-Smith tabled the Modernizing Animal Protections Act last week, a private member's bill bringing much-needed reforms to the laws protecting animals (or lack thereof) at the federal level. Mr Erskine-Smith's bill modernizes the animal-cruelty sections in the Criminal Code, outlaws shark fin products, sets new standards for fur labelling and brings in a long-awaited ban on the import of cat and dog fur into Canada. It's no exaggeration to say Canada is decades behind most developed countries when it comes to animal welfare, and the case of cat and dog fur proves this point. The United States and the European Union banned cat and dog fur imports long ago after learning about the brutal slaughter of millions of companion animals so that their fur can be used for clothing, trim and trinkets.

The vast majority of cat and dog fur comes from China, which has no animal-welfare laws. Dogs and cats have been documented living in filthy, cramped cages, and being killed by strangulation and other inhumane methods of slaughter. Many times, their pelts are a byproduct of the heartbreaking cat and dog meat industry. Cat and dog fur imported into Canada isn't sold as full-length fur coats. It's typically found in smaller amounts, dog fur used to trim parka hoods and cat fur used in toys, figurines or a pair of gloves. Police have even apprehended shipments of counterfeit Canada Goose parkas that use cat and dog fur. We can't count on the Canadian fur industry to shine a light, as it refuses to admit that there is any problem with cat and dog fur. The fur lobby also fights efforts to label fur products with species and country of origin, perhaps because it fears that labels will more directly connect consumers to coyotes that suffered in leghold traps or to foxes that lived in tiny cages before being killed for fashion. This is why fur labels matter. Many Canadians are wearing cat and dog on the trims of their winter jackets without even knowing it, and others are duped into buying unlabelled real fur that they assume is fake. Clear labelling laws will help combat this, and Mr. Erskine-Smith's bill is a good start. A cat and dog fur ban coupled with strong labelling laws will help prevent countless animals for suffering for fashion and trinkets and will help protect consumers from being tricked. This new bill is the first step on a longer path toward bringing animal laws in Canada into the 21st century. Parliament is filled with more animal-friendly MPs and senators than ever before, and Mr. Erskine-Smith's bill is likely to receive broad cross-party support. Let's hope that it's just the first of many legislative efforts to make Canada a world leader in animal protection, instead of a world laggard.