Find Industry and Manufacturing expertise in Canada
- Overview
- Agencies
Manufacturing contributes 13% to Canada’s GDP (2011), which equates to approximately CA$162 billion (US$157 billion). The industry experienced a reduction in workers, with 1.5 million employees in 2009, down from 1.9 million in 2001. In 2011, the manufacturing industry in Canada employed 1.4 million people, with 1.1 million of those employed directly in the production process, and the rest in administrative positions (Industry Canada). The total manufacturing revenue for the same year was $566.3 billion. Canada is rated 19 out of 185 countries by the World Bank for ease of doing business, a ranking based on how conducive the regulatory environment is to the opening and operation of a local firm.
A study in 2009 by Statistics Canada concluded that, although the relative GDP of manufacturing had steadily fallen over the years, from almost 25% in the 1960s to 15.6% in 2005, manufacturing production had steadily increased despite the 2007-2010 global financial crisis. Manufacturing in Canada spans many sub-sectors, including electrical equipment, petroleum and coal, beverage and tobacco – as well as transportation equipment products. The majority of manufacturing sales in 2011 were of transportation equipment, food, and petroleum and coal products, from companies including Suncour Energy and Imperial Energy.
Much of the rest of Canada’s manufacturing industry consists of branch plants of United States firms, with just a few domestic firms. These branch plants provide mainly blue collar and manual jobs, which means that most of the executive and research positions are still based in the United States.
The 2013 Global Competitiveness Report scores and ranks the sophistication of production processes around the world, where a low country score of 1 means “no sophistication and labour intensive” and a high score of 7 means production processes are the “world’s best and apply the most efficient technologies”. In this respect Canada ranks 26 out of 144 countries with a score of 4.84.
Industry Canada (Industrie Canada), located in Ontario, is the main government agency governing manufacturing and industry policy in Canada. The department works closely with organisations and individuals throughout the Canadian economy to continue to increase Canada’s global trade of manufactured products in an increasingly competitive marketplace. The department oversees several other manufacturing and industry boards including the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI) and Corporations Canada.
Industry and Manufacturing organisations in Canada | |
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Industry Canada |
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