OTTAWA -- Nearly half of Canadians believe the country has been a loser under the North American free-trade agreement, a new survey suggests.
Nevertheless, nearly that proportion favours even closer economic ties and trade with the United States and Mexico.
A poll that Ipsos-Reid conducted for a Washington think tank to coincide with the 10-year anniversary of the signing of the deal reported that 47 per cent of Canadians surveyed said the country had lost and 38 per cent said it was a winner under NAFTA.
But it also found Canadians are more likely than Americans or Mexicans to agree with the statement, "We should make trade even closer between these countries and integrate the the three economies further."
Forty-four per cent of Canadians surveyed said they want closer economic ties, while 19 per cent favoured less trade and integration. Another 31 per cent said they want NAFTA relations to stay "the way they are."
NAFTA was signed in December of 1992 and took effect in January of 1994. Today in Washington, the three signers -- former prime minister Brian Mulroney, former U.S. president George Bush and former Mexican president Carlos Salinas de Gortari -- will gather at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars to kick off a two-day conference that will assess the deal.
Ipsos pollster John Wright said the divided Canadian opinions on NAFTA reflect the fact that while persistent trade disputes, such as the cross-border softwood-lumber war, have disappointed some, many are still keen on closer ties.
"Canadians want to be in the game, but they're just not sure the game is being played the way they thought it would be played."
Frustration about NAFTA does not mean overall support levels for it are dropping, Mr. Wright said. This latest poll does not measure overall support.
Ipsos-Reid polls have repeatedly found that close to two-thirds or more of Canadians back the deal, he said.
Thirty-four per cent of the Canadians polled said NAFTA has benefited the country, compared with 40 per cent in a December, 1997, poll. Thirty-eight per cent said NAFTA has hurt Canada, compared with 27 per cent in 1997.
Mr. Wright said regional frustration over trade disputes in provinces such as British Columbia, which has been hit hard by the softwood-lumber war, has affected results.
Despite trade irritants, Canadians were more likely to back expanding NAFTA than are Mexicans or Americans. While 44 per cent of Canadians supported doing this, 39 per cent of the Americans polled favoured closer NAFTA ties, and only one-third of Mexicans liked the idea.
Mexicans feel the most aggrieved about NAFTA, the poll suggests. Fifty-two per cent of those surveyed said their country was a loser under the agreement; only 30 per cent felt they had won.
The poll for the Woodrow Wilson centre surveyed 1,007 Canadians, 1,000 Americans and 503 Mexicans in November. The polling firm describes the Canadian and U.S. results as 95-per-cent likely to be accurate within 3.1 percentage points, upward or downward, and the Mexican results within a margin of error of 4.5 percentage points.
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