Washington should look next door for trade, not just overseas

WASHINGTON state, like every other jurisdiction in North America, is fixated on increasing export and investment opportunities overseas. In the rush to build stronger business relationships with foreign trade partners, we should not overlook our most important and historically most reliable neighbor — Canada.

In 2009, Canada was Washington's second-largest export market (after China). Canada was the largest market for Washington's non-aerospace exports (about $5.9 billion in total sales), more than three times that of China. The largest share of the clean-technology exports went to Canada, almost seven times that of China. An estimated 174,000 jobs in the state were attributed to trade between the two countries.