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Japan and Canada share critical interests that create natural opportunities for co-operation. Japan has focused on building partnerships with Southeast Asian countries … Canada, similarly, is accelerating trade talks not only with Japan, South Korea, and the EU, but also with Indonesia, through the recently concluded Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement.

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Canada and Japan should establish regular ministerial consultations on trade strategy and share intelligence on Chinese economic coercion tactics and the U.S.’s negotiating positions. Joint démarches at the WTO regarding both Chinese coercion and U.S. unilateralism could strengthen multilateral institutions. Enhanced bilateral economic agreements could include critical mineral partnerships, joint infrastructure investments in third countries, and co-ordinated approaches to Indo-Pacific economic frameworks. In addition, regular Track 2 dialogues between business communities could identify concrete co-operation opportunities.

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There are some useful lessons in Australia’s … experience with China’s economic coercion. In that case, the impacts of China’s retaliation proved surprisingly minimal, suggesting the costs of decoupling are lower than what had been assumed. In fact, most of the industries that were targeted successfully shifted to other markets, making China’s market matter less and thereby reducing the fear of trade weaponization and giving Australia more confidence vis-à-vis China.

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As they say in Alberta, “When your neighbour’s barn is on fire, you don’t haggle over the price of water.” Canada and Japan, facing similar pressures from both East and West, would do well to remember that in times of trial, true friendship means standing together rather than cutting separate deals.