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Policy Matters: The Top 3 Topics of 2025
Let’s take a walk down memory lane and revisit the most popular topics of the year to see how things have changed since publication.
Thank you for joining us for another year of Policy Matters, our monthly blog series that turns dense public policy into informative and interesting reads.
While we covered a broad range of topics in 2025, from the B7 to federal procurement to Canada’s skills gap, the standout topics of this year were energy security, economic sovereignty, and Canada’s agriculture and agri-food industry.
Let’s take a walk down memory lane to revisit the most popular topics of the year and see how things have changed since publication.
How to Grow Canada’s Agriculture and Agri-Food Industry
Published in July
Canada’s agriculture and agri-food sector — which spans primary agriculture to processing and distribution, as well as numerous supporting industries — supplied 1 in 9 jobs in Canada, generated around 7% of Canada’s GDP, and exported nearly $100 billion worth of goods in 2023. These numbers prove that the ag and agri-food sector is a cornerstone of Canada’s economy and enormously important to Canadian prosperity. And it has even more to offer.
In our ag and agri-food related Policy Matters, we called on government to support Canadian farmers, producers and industry during geopolitical turbulence, and help Canadian farmers and producers expand into new markets.
It seems the government heard — adjustments to the AgriStability and Advance Payments programs that will provide financial relief to producers affected by trade disruptions. We are also pleased to see support for opening and creating new markets for Canadian agri-food, including funding for AgriMarketing and process modernization at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, included in Budget 2025. However, we continue to urge faster progress on cutting red tape and a greater emphasis on supporting technology adoption and innovation in the sector.
Why Energy Security Matters Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow
Energy is so readily available and reliable in most regions in Canada that we may not always think about where it comes from — or what we’d do without it. The new digital economy needs more power and energy than ever before, and in order for our next generation to compete and thrive, we need to build capacity at home.
Published in February
In this edition of Policy Matters, we raised the issue of getting big projects built. Since February, when this article was originally published, Bill C-5 passed, and the Major Projects Office was opened over the summer. While we commend the government for sending the right signals, we continue to advocate for a fair, consistent and dependable system for all projects. The true barometer of success will be when we no longer need a Major Projects Office to shepherd nation-building projects through the maze of government regulations and red tape.
A more recent update is the Canada-Alberta Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), which states: “Canada and Alberta, working closely with Indigenous Peoples and industry, must work together cooperatively, and within their respective jurisdictions, to foster the conditions necessary for infrastructure, including pipelines, rail, power generation, a strong and integrated transmission grid, ports and other means that will unlock and grow natural resource production and transportation in Western Canada.”
Achieving Canada’s potential to be an energy superpower and dealing with increasing geopolitical shifts requires unprecedented levels of federal-provincial collaboration. We’ve long called for provincial, territorial and federal governments to work together so we can build a responsible and thriving energy sector, invite investment, create jobs, and strengthen Canada’s competitiveness.
Why It’s Time to Go All-In on Canada’s Economic Sovereignty
In response to U.S. tariffs and Canada’s economic challenges, we launched the All-In Canada Plan in February, which focuses on doing what’s in our control to build a stronger, more resilient Canadian economy. The plan focused on four priority areas: internal trade, infrastructure, red tape, and taxes.
Deliver on the promise of free internal trade
There has been positive progress on this priority throughout the year, but we are especially encouraged that provincial, territorial and federal governments signed the Canadian Mutual Recognition Agreement in November. This agreement allows thousands of products to be traded across internal borders and is a positive step toward the free movement of goods, reducing fragmentation and lowering costs for Canadian businesses. We look forward to both the implementation and the expansion of this deal to cover all goods.
Improve existing trade infrastructure
Canada’s economic success is rooted in being a trading nation. However, the transportation of goods across Canada to other provinces/territories and internationally has not been efficient or reliable for years. Unfortunately, we haven’t seen much positive momentum on this priority. Though the Federal Budget included the creation of the Trade Diversification Corridors Fund and the Arctic Infrastructure Fund, these investments must be followed by concrete action on reducing regulatory red tape for all infrastructure projects, not just those designated by the Major Projects Office.
Cut red tape
While we believe the Federal Budget has heard businesses’ call to focus on the economy, there is still a desperate need to reduce the amount of red tape. According to the Canadian Chamber’s Business Data Lab (BDL), we’ve only seen reductions in red tape during times of crisis, like the global economic crisis in 2008 and the COVID-19 pandemic. Otherwise, government regulations have steadily increased since 2006 — especially in the past five years. BDL projects that the total number of federal regulatory requirements reached approximately 348,700 in 2025 — up from 320,900 in 2021 — and each federal regulation takes an average of nine hours to comply with!
In July, the government announced a Red Tape Review. The results of the 60-day reports identified 500 recent achievements and forward-looking actions to reduce regulatory red tape. This represents a critical opportunity. In December, the private and public sectors came together at the Red Tape Reduction Summit, hosted in partnership with the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat. Our collective aim was to build a more competitive and business-friendly regulatory and to find a way to make reducing red tape a permanent fixture of our government operations, from the Major Projects Office to Health Canada and beyond.
Published in March
Lower Taxes
Canada hasn’t conducted a comprehensive review of our tax system since the late 1960s — a lot has changed since then. At such an uncertain time, the government should be doing everything it can to provide stability.
The social programs and services Canadians value depend on the public revenues generated from the private sector. To truly better these programs, the government needs to help the private sector grow — otherwise they’ll continue to tax a tapped-out base.
We were pleased to see that the government cancelled the proposed capital gains inclusion rate increase and that the Federal Budget removed the divisive digital services tax, a known trade irritant with the U.S. — but these are just the start. While tariffs are today’s concern, it will be the structural changes to U.S. tax and regulatory regimes that will truly challenge Canada’s long-term competitiveness.
Other Blogs
A Recap of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce’s 2025 Hill Day
What We Heard: Industry, Digital and Technology B7 Ministerial Side Event
