Committee Makes Case for International Trade Corridor

(Rose Sanchez — Prairie Post)

There has been an increase in initiatives to get expanded border crossing hours and more ports in both southwestern Saskatchewan, and even in southeastern Alberta, but officials with the North/South Trade Corridor Committee, believe Highway 4, running through Val Marie and the Port of Monchy/Morgan, provides the best option for the creation of an international trade corridor.

The committee was first struck in the early 1990s, but Ervin Carlier, the Saskatchewan co-chair, says once Senator Max Baucus endorsed the route from Billings to the Canadian border as a designated primary arterial highway, the committee “went home”.

“We thought ... that Canada and the (Saskatchewan) government would do their part and we would soon have our 24-hour port,” says Carlier.

In a letter sent out in January of this year, committee members said the Saskatchewan economy went into a tailspin and highways worsened.

“Not surprisingly talk of an extended hours customs port fell by the wayside.”

As the economy began to boom once again, political attitudes changed and it became apparent Saskatchewan is an exporting province, the committee decided to re-form and again lobby for the Port of Monchy to become an international trade corridor for Saskatchewan. Read more here.