00:00Let's talk now to Radhika Desai, who's a professor in the Department of Political Studies at the University of Manitoba.
00:05Good to see you, Radhika. Thanks for coming on the program.
00:08So, Canada's Prime Minister there saying he wants to build trade relationships away from the United States.
00:13How important could India be in this story?
00:17I think that India is clearly expected to be very important.
00:21The grounds on which the visit of Kani is being sold in Canada to Canadians, who are very eager for
00:28a diversification of trade relations away from the United States,
00:32is that India is the fastest growing major economy in the world.
00:37Of course, if you look more closely at these statistics, they don't bear much scrutiny.
00:43I think India's growth has been wildly exaggerated.
00:46Nevertheless, Prime Minister Kani is there.
00:49He has projected the visit as being primarily about business, primarily about trade and investment.
00:56And by the way, that means two-way investment.
00:59And this is to draw attention away from the tense relationship between Canada and India so far for the last
01:07several years.
01:07So, clearly, Mr. Kani wants to come away with some good deals.
01:13There's talk about a SIPA, a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement, which Indian officials and Canadian officials say may be signed
01:22within a year.
01:24Well, as you alluded to there, there have been strained relations in recent years.
01:28This visit being billed as a chance to reset those.
01:31How likely is it that a comprehensive trade deal that's been talked about will actually be reached?
01:38Well, certainly we know that from recent experience on the Indian side, at least,
01:45the recent experience with the trade deals with the EU and so on,
01:52India has been fast-tracking trade deals.
01:54India also has a trade deal with the United States, although, of course, its future now is a little bit
02:00uncertain.
02:01But, nevertheless, these were fast-tracked.
02:03So, on India's side, Prime Minister Modi is certainly very eager to look, shall we say, hyperactive on the trade
02:10agenda front.
02:11And, of course, both India and Canada have been hard-hit by the Trump tariffs.
02:17So, the urgency is there on both sides.
02:19The question will then be, you know, how easy is it to sort out the relationships?
02:25And I think that, as I say, both governments seem to want to prioritize negotiations.
02:30So, Mark Carney here going on, you might call it a charm offensive, not just going to India, but other
02:34places planned.
02:35He also recently secured a deal with China.
02:37What might a potential deal with India mean for those other trade relationships?
02:43Well, you know, in this trip, of course, Mark Carney has to sign a deal with China
02:49because China is the most important economy in the world today.
02:53I mean, if you think about it, while the United States is perhaps equally important,
02:57the United States is on the decline, China remains on the rise.
03:01So, that was absolutely inevitable.
03:03But it's important to remember that Mark Carney, while, of course, doing this,
03:08he is also going, you know, in this trip, not only to India, but to Australia and Japan.
03:14And, clearly, this is part of his attempt to try to sort of muscle in on the quad relationship,
03:22the quadrilateral relationship, you know, without the United States,
03:27sort of saying to these countries that they should deal with Canada in a certain sense.
03:33And I think it's important to also realize that when Mark Carney made his famous Davos speech,
03:38in which he spoke about the urgency of diversifying trade relations away from the United States,
03:44he still seemed to prioritize the old traditional business partners, trading partners of Canada, Europe in particular,
03:55and then, of course, those who have always been part of a sort of Western alliance.
04:00So, you are still seeing hints of that.
04:02I don't know how long that will last, whether this kind of bias will persist,
04:07but certainly it's there in this visit.
04:10Professor, it was great to talk to you.
04:12Thanks so much for coming on the program.
04:13That's Professor Radhika Desai from the University of Manitoba.
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