B.C. residents urged to ‘buy Canadian,’ but that may be easier said than done

How you spend your money is being touted as a weapon in what could be a looming trade war with the United States.

U.S. President Donald Trump reiterated his threats Thursday to impose tariffs on Canadian goods or annex the country.

“We don’t need them to make our cars – and they make a lot of them. We don’t need their lumber. We have our own forests, etc. etc. We don’t need their oil and gas. We have more than anybody,” he proclaimed to the audience at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, via video.

B.C. Premier David Eby, speaking at a mining conference Thursday, pushed back on the idea, identifying something America needs from B.C. – germanium, a rare chemical element that’s produced in China and at the Tek smelter in Trail. It’s used for making night-vision goggles used by the U.S. military and is already banned for export to the United States by China.

“And as a result of that ban, if the United States does get germanium from Canada – and specifically Tek smelter – you can’t get it anywhere,” Eby told the conference.

Eby has also pushed for British Columbians to hold off on travel to the U.S.

B.C. Conservative finance critic Peter Milobar says with the Canadian dollar so low, vacations to the U.S. are likely to be low anyways, and sabre-rattling only stands to hurt local tourism if American travellers also opt to stay home.

“U.S. travellers are three-quarters of our incoming international travellers every year into British Columbia, and so there’s no way the rest of Canada would make up that difference for us,” said Milobar Thursday.

The premier on Tuesday also encouraged people to buy Canadian.

That’s something that’s easier said than done, says Dr. Lenore Newman, an agriculture expert and professor at the University of the Fraser Valley, who points to regulations preventing processing plants for produce being built on B.C.’s farmland.

“It’s winter, and a lot of our processing is done elsewhere because of the red tape around our processing industry,” said Newman on Thursday.

“The government needs to immediately fix the processing situation in B.C.”

Newman added that changes to the regulations were recommended five years ago, but have not been acted upon.