{"id":919671,"date":"2026-10-04T00:30:41","date_gmt":"2026-10-04T00:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/919671\/"},"modified":"2026-10-04T00:30:41","modified_gmt":"2026-10-04T00:30:41","slug":"prairies-to-vancouver-trade-corridor-called-most-important","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/919671\/","title":{"rendered":"Prairies-to-Vancouver trade corridor called most important"},"content":{"rendered":"

The federal government is determined to diversify trade away<\/a> from the United States, and the only way that happens is by moving more goods, grain, oilseeds, petroleum, minerals and other products by rail or road to ports.<\/p>\n

To help accomplish this mission, the feds have designated four trade corridors that link major production regions to overseas markets.<\/p>\n

Of the four, one corridor is clearly the most important, says the president and chief executive officer of Fertilizer Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would argue that the Prairies to Vancouver is the No. 1 corridor (that) we need to focus on,\u201d Michael Bourque said from his office in Ottawa.<\/p>\n

WHY IT MATTERS: Increasing exports through ports will require billions in public and private capital to improve transportation networks. That money can\u2019t be spent on anything and everything, so which route should be the priority?<\/p>\n

The federal government has created a Trade Diversification Corridors Fund, which designates four corridors<\/a> as nationally significant:<\/p>\n

Pacific<\/p>\n

The Prairies<\/p>\n

Central (Ontario\/Quebec)<\/p>\n

Atlantic<\/p>\n

The Pacific route enables the export of \u201cenergy, grain, potash, metals, and minerals produced primarily in the Prairies and Western Canada,\u201d says Transport Canada\u2019s website.<\/p>\n

Export data and volume product clearly shows that this corridor is the most significant export route in the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cObjectively, the most traffic goes from the Prairies to Vancouver,\u201d Bourque said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe data doesn\u2019t lie.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Map<\/p>\n

The Pacific Trade Corridor runs from the Prairies to Canada\u2019s West Coast
\n Photo:
\n Transport Canada<\/p>\n

Fertilizer Canada and many industry groups are hopeful that the federal government is serious about improving the Pacific corridor and all trade corridors.<\/p>\n

Those same groups support Bill C-39<\/a>, the Building Canada Strong Act.<\/p>\n

The government introduced C-39 in September, saying it will improve and accelerate reviews of major projects, which will give \u201cinvestors greater certainty to deploy capital.\u201d<\/p>\n

Second Narrows bottleneck<\/p>\n

Also in September, a busy month for the federal government, Prime Minister Mark Carney unveiled the Productivity Mega Deduction.<\/a><\/p>\n

It allows firms to write off <\/a>100 per cent of the cost of eligible capital investments in the year that they make the investment.<\/p>\n

The Second Narrows Rail Bridge<\/a> in Vancouver is an excellent example of where private capital is needed in the Pacific trade corridor.<\/p>\n

The mechanical lift bridge, made from steel, allows ships to pass under when in the up position. When the bridge is down, it\u2019s the only way for trains to access the North Shore grain, potash and coal terminals at Vancouver\u2019s port.<\/p>\n

It carries almost one-third of all cargo that annually moves through the Port of Vancouver \u2014 43.7 million tonnes in 2024.<\/p>\n

More than 20 groups, representing farmers, fertilizer companies and shippers, are urging Carney<\/a> to build a second bridge at the same location or replace it.<\/p>\n

However, Canadian National Railway owns the bridge, so investing hundreds of millions to replace it isn\u2019t a decision for the prime minister.<\/p>\n

Bigger picture, exporting more grain, fertilizer, minerals and products through West Coast ports is more complicated than fixing one bridge in British Columbia\u2019s Lower Mainland.<\/p>\n

It will require investments in rail sidings, other bridges and infrastructure that connects the Prairies to ports in Vancouver and Prince Rupert.<\/p>\n

However, Bill C-39 and the Mega Deduction proposal should make those investments more likely.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is going to enable private capital to be deployed,\u201d Bourque said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know government will spend money\u2026. It\u2019s equally or more important to ensure the private sector is going to deploy capital.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The federal government is determined to diversify trade away from the United States, and the only way that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":919672,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[45,49,48,13744,169677,46,9383,100234,247502,257706,2659,136848,32263,1215],"class_list":["post-919671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canadian-national-railway","tag-canadian-pacific-railway","tag-economy","tag-exports","tag-fertilizer","tag-grain-transportation","tag-indo-pacific-trade","tag-mark-carney","tag-port-of-vancouver","tag-railways","tag-trade"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919671","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=919671"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/919671\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/919672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=919671"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=919671"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=919671"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}