Cheaper goods could be arriving sooner than expected as efforts are under way to speed up the implementation of the free-trade deal between Canada and the European Union.
EU officials are currently looking at whether there are parts of the deal that do not require approval of the 28 member states and could be launched before the agreement is officially ratified.
The Bank of Canada is abruptly abandoning an explicit warning that its key interest rate is headed higher in the face of a much gloomier economic outlook.
Cautioning that Canada is likely to grow much more slowly than it thought in the summer, the central bank now acknowledges that its next move is just as likely to be a rate cut, as an increase.
The following is excerpted from a 22 October 2013 news release by Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada.
Canada and the European Union have reached a "political agreement" on free trade that the federal government says could boost Canada's annual income by as much as $12 billion annually, and bilateral trade by 20 per cent.
While the deal is not expected to be ratified for at least two years, it is expected to remove 98 per cent of EU tariffs on a wide range of Canadian products.
Spending by Corporate Canada is expected to ramp up in 2014 as global economies, particularly the US, continue to show signs of improvement, says a report by CIBC Economics.
