Carney Lands Two Asian Trade Deals as Canada Looks Beyond the US
Canada concluded negotiations for a free trade agreement with the Philippines and substantially concluded an ASEAN Canada free trade agreement, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced in Manila on November 14, in a twin win for Ottawa’s push to look beyond the United States.
Both agreements are expected to be signed in 2027, according to Carney’s office. The announcements came as Carney met Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on the sidelines of the 49th ASEAN Summit, where Canada attended as Guest of the Chair, and they capped a week in which trade diversification moved to the centre of Canadian policy.
A deal with Manila in a year
Canada and the Philippines launched talks on a free trade agreement just one year ago, and the negotiations are now concluded, with the two countries working toward signature in 2027. The deal drops over 90 percent of tariff lines and covers agriculture, aerospace and artificial intelligence, Carney said, and he described it as the most comprehensive trade agreement the Philippines has signed.
Total trade between Canada and the Philippines was about 2.4 billion dollars in 2025, and Carney said he expects bilateral trade to triple over the next decade. The two countries also announced 26 million dollars in investments to support closer ties, and the deal is expected to help triple trade to more than 10 billion dollars a year by 2035, according to reports.
A market of nearly 700 million people
The ASEAN Canada free trade agreement covers nearly 700 million people and an economy near 6 trillion dollars, according to the prime minister’s office. Once in force, it is expected to add nearly 2 billion dollars to Canada’s GDP and create around 14,000 jobs, particularly in agriculture and manufacturing, with the remaining steps to be completed as quickly as possible.
Carney said the pacts are part of a strategy to build a dense web of reliable partners and reduce Canada’s relative reliance on the United States, after a long trade war with Washington. He next travels to Phnom Penh for the Francophonie summit, then to Shenzhen for APEC on November 18 and 19, where he will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping. The full account is carried in the report on the trade deals, which sets out the terms announced in Manila.
