Please find outlined below an article provided by Scott Bozek, Consul for Commercial Affairs with the United States Commercial Service of the U.S. Consulate in Toronto, Ontario. The article provides highlights of the services provided to Canadian and American based companies. AmCham Canada encourages its members to contact Scott and his colleagues to explore how the United States Commercial Service can be of assistant in their “cross border” activities.
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THE U.S. COMMERCIAL SERVICE DEVELOPS U.S.-CANADIAN
TRADE, INVESTMENT AND TOURISM
The United States’ largest trading partner by far is Canada, with over $1.5 billion worth of goods being exchanged between the two countries every day in 2008. Canada is the number one export market for 36 of the 50 U.S. States. The U.S. Commercial Service in Canada or CS Canada is the leading agency of the U.S. Government that develops bilateral trade, investment and tourism.
The U.S. Commercial Service in Canada, an organization belonging to the U. S. Department of Commerce, has as its core missions: the promotion of U.S. exports to Canada; the attraction of direct investment to the United States; and, the attraction of Canadian travelers to the United States. The U.S. Commercial Service has offices in over 80 countries throughout the world and approximately 110 Export Assistance Centers in the United States.
The U.S. Commercial Service in Canada (CS Canada) provides American companies with a wide range of cost-effective business development services, including market research, corporate matchmaking and assistance in finding Canadian agents and distributors.
CS Canada also provides services for Canadian companies looking for U.S. products and services. One example is the International Buyer Program, which organizes Canadian buyer delegations to trade shows in the United States and provides scheduled meetings and logistics for Canadian companies at the show.
CS Canada provides trade counseling and connects local Canadian companies with U.S. suppliers exhibiting at local trade fairs. Canadian companies may obtain valuable information on U.S. products and suppliers from theBusiness Information Centers and Catalogue Exhibition organized by CS Canada, or from the free magazine Commercial News USA and from the BuyUSA.gov website.
CS Canada also organizes a unique matchmaking event called RepCAN. For the event’s 14th edition, RepCAN 2009, more than 50 Canadian companies registered to meet 14 U.S. suppliers here in Toronto during the end of September. Next year’s RepCAN 2010 event, to be held in June 2010, aims to provide its free service of matchmaking to an even larger number of Canadian companies looking to be agents and distributors of U.S. companies.
CS Canada recently introduced of a leading U.S. provider of Smart Grid solutions to the Association of Power Producers of Ontario (APPrO) conference in Toronto. CS Canada organized meetings for 12 Canadian utility companies and other organizations interested in the US technology.
CS Canada offers business facilitation services through its offices in Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary.
The U.S. Commercial Service in Toronto can be contacted via the following coordinates: Telephone: (416) 595-5412, Fax: (416) 595-5419, Email: toronto.office.box@mail.doc.gov, Website: www.buyusa.gov/canada.
Scott Bozek, Consul for Commercial Affairs, United States Commercial Service
Stefan Popescu, Commercial Specialist, U.S. Commercial Service, Toronto
