OPINION: Carney offers a new view of Canadian foreign policy
(Image courtesy of CBC)
This week, Prime Minister Mark Carney met with President Xi Jinping, marking the first visit to China by a Canadian prime minister since 2017. It was also the first such visit since Canadian–Sino relations sharply deteriorated following the 2018 detention of Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig in China, which occurred shortly after the arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou in Canada. All three returned to their respective countries in 2021, and in 2022 the United States dropped its charges against Wanzhou, formally closing that chapter of the dispute.
The summit comes at a moment when Canada–US relations have reached their lowest point in decades, following President Donald Trump’s trade war against Canada, launching shortly after his inauguration in January 2025. With Washington increasingly viewed as an unreliable economic partner, the Canadian government has been actively seeking to diversify trade away from the United States. Both Carney and Xi appear eager to move past the hostilities of recent years, a willingness possibly underscored by the Carney government’s “advice” for two MPs to leave Taiwan early.
That diplomatic reset quickly translated into concrete economic outcomes. The two governments announced a deal under which Canada will reduce tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles from 100 percent to 6.1 percent and allow the import of up to 49,000 Chinese EVs. In return, China pledged to reduce its tariff on Canadian canola seed from a combined rate of 84 percent to 15 percent, reopening a crucial market for Canadian farmers.
This shift toward China signals that Carney is serious about reorienting Canadian trade policy. While Canada’s foreign policy has never fully mirrored that of the United States, maintaining relations with countries like Cuba and declining to officially join the US-led invasion of Iraq, there had been a growing perception in recent years that Ottawa was aligning itself too closely with Washington, particularly during the Trudeau–Biden era. Donald Trump’s return to office in 2025 upended that dynamic, and Carney was elected on a clear mandate to diversify Canada’s trade relationships. This agreement suggests he intends to follow through.
The announcement was swiftly condemned by Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre and Ontario Premier Doug Ford, both of whom argued that the deal would harm Canada’s auto sector by “flooding” the market with cheaper Chinese vehicles and undermining domestic manufacturing. However, this appears to be a trade-off Carney is prepared to accept if it reduces Canada’s dependence on the United States.
Taken together, the deal represents a broader shift in Canada’s global posture, from being a steadfast US ally to a more independent, albeit still aligned, partner willing to pursue its own economic interests. Yet Carney should remain cautious. Replacing reliance on a hostile or unpredictable trading partner with another potentially hostile one carries its own risks. As China continues to expand its global economic footprint, those risks grow more pronounced, particularly given that, unlike in the United States, political change in China cannot be achieved through electoral turnover. Diversification may be necessary, but it should not come at the cost of trading one vulnerability for another.
