Canada's traders must change their competitive DNA

William Polushin is founding director of the Program for International Competitiveness at the Desautels Faculty of Management, McGill University, and President of AMAXIS, an international business and operational development services firm.

As I discussed in my last blog entry, competitive advantage in the global economy is driven by knowledge, but knowledge that effectively integrates information and intelligence, discovery, know-how and expertise, and business and research networks.

In Canada: A Nation of Traders, that means our enterprises -- small medium and large, and across industry -- must understand how to best leverage international trade, continuously innovate, and manage in increasingly integrated and competitive business environment if they are to profitably grow in the 21st century.

For many exporters, importers and direct investors that means rethinking their international business models. For our governments, that means reworking their trade policy and promotion formulas that have governed Canada's approach to international trade for years. As illustrated in the following diagram, the traditional view of trade has been predominantly linear and uni-dimensional. Trade, for the most part, has been defined in export terms (imports are seen as a drag on the nation's economic output) and direct investment strategies have been largely fragmented between or among markets.

Read full article: The Globe and Mail, October 3, 2011