Canada's Trade with the World, by Product

The automotive sector, along with the oil and gas sector, account for the bulk of Canada's imports represented in this table. The same may be said of exports. The situation with petroleum may seem anomalous for an oil exporter such as Canada. However, it reflects the location of Canada’s oil reserves. Canada’s western provinces (British Columbia, Alberta and Saskatchewan) exported 77% and the eastern provinces (Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland) imported 80% of Canada’s mineral oils, fuels and waxes in 2012. Perhaps the most remarkable feature of this data is the importance of automotive exports, as evidenced by the 11% share of total Canadian domestic exports that are represented by just one class of vehicle. The vast majority of Canada's automotive exports are destined for the United States. Canada often chides itself for too heavy a reliance on primary (commodity) exports. To be sure, such exports are very important in our overall trade profile, as witnessed by the fact that they make up five of the top 10 exports in this table. Due to higher demand and prices, crude petroleum oil exports captured a 17% share of Canada's exports to the world in 2012. But automobiles and their parts continue to be the most significant elements of Canada's overall trade profile for a number of years.

Canada’s Trade with the World, by Product, 2012
	Canadian Imports from World		Canadian Exports to World
	Merchandise Classification	%	Merchandise Classification	%
1	Boilers, mechanical appliances, etc.	15.30	Mineral fuels, oils	27.11
2	Motor vehicles, trailers, bicycles, motorcycles	14.59	Motor vehicles, trailers, bicycles, motorcycles	14.09
3	Mineral fuels, oils	11.14	Boilers, mechanical appliances, etc.	6.61
4	Electrical machinery and equipment	9.81	Pearls, precious stones or metals	5.23
5	Pearls, precious stones or metals	3.34	Plastic and plastic articles	2.72
6	Plastic and plastic articles	3.26	Electrical machinery and equipment	2.58
7	Optical, medical, scientific, technical instrumentation	2.91	Wood and wood articles, charcoal	2.33
8	Pharmaceutical products	2.65	Aircraft and spacecraft	2.31
9	Iron or steel articles	2.64	Ores, slag and ash	2.05
10	Furniture and stuffed furnishings	1.95	Aluminum and aluminum articles	1.99

	Top 10 as % of total from the World	67.60	Top 10 as % of total to the World	67.01

Source: Trade Data Online. Industry Canada. 5 March 2013. http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/tdo-dcd.nsf/eng/Home
Reproduced with the permission of the Minister of Public Works and Government Services Canada.

Notes: The table is based on Harmonised System (HS) codes at the 6-digit level. Commodities are assigned these codes in order that accurate trade records can be kept, tariffs collected appropriately, customs procedures followed, and so forth. The HS system of codes, at its most disaggregated, assigns a 10-digit code to a given item. As the degree of aggregation increases, the number of digits in the code decreases. Thus, for example, the 6-digit HS code assigned to a motor vehicle with a spark-type ignition and a cylinder capacity of more than 3000 cc is 870323. The 2-digit HS code (in this case it is 87) includes not only this type of vehicle, but also many other types of vehicles and a wide variety of vehicle accessories and parts. To learn more about the HS Code system used by Statistics Canada go to http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/tdo-dcd.nsf/eng/h_00048.html.