The Canadian Federation of Independent Business grades governments every year on how well they're tearing down trade walls between provinces. This year, Ottawa moved from a C to an A-plus. Most provinces landed an A or A-minus alongside it. Only Nunavut came in low, at a C-minus. That's a two-grade jump for the federal government in a single year, and the numbers behind it back the grade up.
The One Canadian Economy Act, passed in June 2025, eliminated a stack of federal regulations that had been slowing cross-border trade. Ottawa removed every one of its own exceptions to the 2017 Canada Free Trade Agreement. Every province signed a Canada Mutual Recognition Agreement, meaning a product cleared for sale in one province no longer needs a second round of approvals to be sold in the next. The International Monetary Fund estimates that fully removing internal trade barriers could add $210 billion to Canada's economy over the long run.
The CFIB polled more than 1,000 member businesses between March and May to see what the changes felt like from the ground. Sixty-two percent said they'd looked to other domestic markets or suppliers to offset losses from U.S. tariffs, which is exactly the shift these agreements are meant to make easier. More than a quarter said removing internal trade barriers could let them offer more competitive pricing. A similar share expected their customers to see a wider selection of goods. Seventeen percent said trade had gotten harder rather than easier, a number worth tracking, but a minority next to the rest of the data.
Not every barrier moves at the same speed. Mutual recognition currently covers the sale of goods, not always their use, so a chainsaw built in Alberta can be sold in British Columbia even where local rules on operating it haven't caught up yet. Alcohol is further behind still: only Manitoba and New Brunswick had fully opened direct sales across provincial lines by the time this report card was published. Keyli Loeppky of the CFIB, who's tracked this file for five years, said the same governments barely responding a few years ago are now setting real deadlines, and framed the current gap simply: progress on paper is not yet progress in practice everywhere.
That gap is where the opportunity sits. The CFIB plans to overhaul its grading method for next year to keep pressure on implementation, which means the businesses paying attention now, tracking exactly which barrier has fallen in which province, get a head start on everyone waiting for the news to catch up to them.