While both federal and provincial governments continue to chip away at Canada’s internal trade barriers, Canadian firms still face a morass of regulations which often makes trading within Canada more difficult than trading with foreign countries. Without access to a centralized, easy-to-use data portal, this issue will continue for years. 

Despite the adoption of the Canadian Free Trade Agreement (CFTA) in 2017, internal trade barriers continue to impose significant costs on Canadian businesses by limiting access to interprovincial markets and creating a patchwork of compliance requirements. These barriers contribute to estimated economic losses of up to $80 billion annually which, if resolved, could result in a gain of approximately 3.8% to national GDP. 

This issue is made worse by opacity, where neither the status of negotiations nor the specifics of regulatory differences are consistently available to businesses or the public. A 2021 report by Deloitte noted this problem and specifically recommended the creation of “a public repository of information about trade barriers in Canada.” 

In response to demand for improved trade data, Statistics Canada launched the Canadian Internal Trade Data and Information Hub. This tool provides aggregated economic statistics on interprovincial trade volumes and patterns, but it’s aimed primarily at policymakers and analysts, not at business-owners looking for information and clarification. 

To maximize the impact of Bill C5 and maintain public and business confidence in its effectiveness, a Centralized Transparency Portal should be developed as an implementation support tool. This portal would serve as the single authoritative, publicly accessible source of information on the current regulatory status of goods and services under mutual recognition, the phasein timelines and exceptions granted under Bill C5, and progress on enforcement actions and compliance by provinces and territories. 

2025-ongoing