Attracting and retaining FDI during COVID-19: Canada’s Trade Commissioner Service
How you can profit from cooperating with Canada’s Trade Commissioner Service – Example Germany
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused the most significant global economic crisis since the end of World War II some 75 years ago. No one can tell when it will be all over.
Companies have been developing strategies to manage this challenge. Internationally operating companies have an advantage: They are active in many markets and can adopt to economic recovery more flexibly. A successful internationalization strategy requires innovative products at acceptable prices. These companies diversify their client base through both exports and by investing in other markets.
Foreign investors are particularly attractive for economic developers: They bring jobs and dollars to the market, enable higher productivity, increase the international competitiveness of the chosen location, and contribute to higher living standards in the community.
Prior to the crisis, Canadian regions and municipalities had competed quite successfully for their share of the cake. Then came March 2020 and caused worldwide travel restrictions, lockdowns, competition for sanitary products, financial liquidity challenges, slumping market demand, and skyrocketing unemployment. In Canada, the COVD-19 Economic Response Plan has helped fight these challenges quite timely.
Global Affairs Canada’s Trade Commissioner Service has worked tirelessly to identify new trade opportunities for Canadian companies and to continue attracting foreign investors to our country. How can the Trade Commissioner Service and you cooperate in easing at least some of the COVID-19 impediments regarding the attraction, retention and expansion of inbound foreign direct investment?
Examples from Canada’s investment team in Germany will illustrate successful collaboration with Canadian economic developers.
About the Speaker
Detlef Engler
Detlef Engler
As Trade Commissioner and Senior Investment Counsellor at the Embassy of Canada to Germany, Mr. Engler looks back at 20+ years of advising German investment prospects on all aspects of site selection in Canada, from providing value propositions, cost analyses, to counseling on financing options and incentive packages.
Across the Canadian Trade Commissioner Service, Mr. Engler is a well-known strategist combining theoretical concepts of foreign direct investment attraction with the experience of counseling senior executives of numerous German investors. Global Affairs Canada’s has been using him as a mentor, coaching Trade Commissioners around the globe on how to convince senior company executives on Canada’s investment advantages.
