Aviation Drives Canadian Trade Growth

Canada’s most ambitious economic goals – diversified trade, stronger global alliances, and growth that reaches every region – share a single dependency. They move by air. Our airports connect cargo, businesses, investors and communities together as one Canadian economy, and to the whole world.

Canada’s airports are already investing today for future growth and next generation technologies. We’re setting a course with government that reduces red tape on travellers, airports and carriers, keeps air travel affordable, and reinvests in a robust system that makes Canada strong.

The government has set a clear and ambitious course: double non-U.S. exports, open hundreds of billions of investments in new overseas markets, build one connected economy, strengthen Canada’s alliances and sovereignty, and grow opportunity in every province and territory. Each of these goals rests on the same thing — the ability to move high-value goods and the people who bring them to market quickly, reliably, and far. That is what aviation does.

It is also more unified than most people realize: roughly half of Canada’s highest-value exports travel in the belly of a passenger aircraft. Passenger and cargo are not two separate stories. They are one network, generating nearly $50 billion in GDP, supporting 435,000 jobs, and connecting some 5,000 communities to one another and to the world. At the same time, Canada’s trade and transportation strategy has understandably centred on bulk goods moving by rail, ports, and roads, where tonnage tells the story. Aviation’s value is measured differently: in speed, in the criticality of what it carries, and in its reach to every region — and bringing it more fully into the national picture is a clear opportunity to strengthen the whole system.

Airports are run like private businesses, with growth objectives, to drive efficiencies and try new things. Canadian airports are actually net-contributors to Canadian taxpayers, not an expense — with $8.4 billion paid as rent to the federal treasury since devolution from within government to arms-length local governance in the 1990’s. And, to ensure long term sustainability and affordability, each airport has a public-interest, non-profit mandate that requires serving local needs and reinvesting all proceeds back into airport infrastructure — over $30 billion in that same period. They are ready to meet demand that is set to double, and to source the $28 billion in infrastructure investment the coming decade requires.

There is a tremendous opportunity in government’s recognition of airports as strategic economic and resilience infrastructure — and working with the sector as a force for growth. A clear and achievable set of modernization actions is ready to go and would unlock this capacity immediately. Bringing aviation fully into Canada’s economic resilience, trade and growth strategy is one of the highest-return, lowest-cost moves available — a partnership that pays off for travellers, shippers, communities, and the country.

Speed And Quality Is the Business Model

For Canada’s premium perishable exports, speed isn’t a competitive edge — it’s the entire business model. Atlantic seafood and B.C.’s seasonal fruit command top dollar on the world stage only because they can reach an international buyer in under 48 hours, fresh. That depends on a flawless, time-sensitive logistics chain, and air is its backbone.

Demand is already proving the case: air cargo tonnage through Canadian airports rose more than 44% between 2016 and 2023. And because so much high-value freight flies in the belly of passenger aircraft, the regional airports that feed the national network are as essential to this trade as the major gateways.

As Canada sets ambitious and urgent targets to meet new global markets, grow local economies, and catalyze high value investment and good careers in all regions, our airports throughout this nation are more important than ever before.

When Speed Is a Matter of Survival

Some shipments can’t wait. Biologics, critical therapies, complex medical devices, and medical isotopes move on the clock, and air is the only mode fast enough to carry them. More than $23.4 billion in essential medical goods moves through Canadian airports every year. The proportions tell the story: air handles only about 15% of Canada’s freight by weight, but that 15% accounts for more than half of its value. High-speed air corridors keep Canada’s life-sciences sector and frontline healthcare systems moving.
Canadian businesses also rely on time-sensitive and critical inbound shipping. If a manufacturer needs an urgent replacement part from a foreign OEM to keep their line up and running, it comes by air as quickly and directly as possible — getting workers back on the job and products moving to market again. Our export and economic growth depends on these just-in-time supply chains, and Canada cannot afford disruption or delays that impact local economic engines.

Finally, air travel connects communities of innovators and professionals, helping talent and expertise move freely to expand possibilities, connect and collaborate, and to open new markets. Canada excels when our homegrown businesses and talent gets together and enters new markets, and local economies prosper when businesses and groups from around the world choose to access Canada as their preferred destination to gather, discuss and connect on to the broader world.

Connecting Every Corner to Every Market

True economic prosperity leaves no community behind. For thousands of rural, remote, and northern communities, the airport isn’t part of the supply chain — it is the supply chain, and the direct link to global commerce, medical access, and emergency response.

Aviation turns hyper-local industries into international players, and gets local people and businesses the supplies and goods they need to level up and create local growth. But this layer of the network is under pressure: flight frequency at small regional airports remains 34% below pre-pandemic levels. The $1 billion Arctic Infrastructure Fund rightly recognizes that northern airports are dual-use assets, serving both community need and national defence. That principle should extend across the whole network. Regional connectivity is national infrastructure, not a local amenity — and small populations and market forces alone cannot finance that national role.

Canada’s full airport system needs a new dedicated growth-and-resilience program for small and medium airports that today fall through the cracks of existing economic and infrastructure programs, and a recapitalized safety and security program for very small airports — backed by recognition that regional and northern airports are strategic national assets.

The Export That Arrives Here by Plane

Tourism is Canada’s premier service export, and it works differently from any other: the customer comes here. In 2025, more than 11 million international visitors arrived by air and injected over $23 billion in foreign capital straight into a wide array of local communities — fuelling accommodations, dining, and experiences from the moment a flight lands. It’s a tariff-free return on world-class Canadian experiences. And it scales: travel and tourism already account for some 30% of all Canadian services exports, and the sector is positioned to deliver up to 10% of Canada’s non-U.S. export ambition by 2030. In balance-of-payments terms, the business travellers, investors, and visitors who arrive by air are as much an export story as the goods in the hold going the other way.

There is a real opportunity to do even better. While peers in Europe and the United States have moved ahead on digitizing the traveller journey, Canada is well positioned to catch up quickly and lead — by modernizing the technologies and processes that move people through our airports. A more connected, efficient, and affordable system, with a radically better traveller experience, is a win-win-win that government and the sector can deliver together. And because a better travel experience attracts more tourists, personal, and business travellers to choose Canada, seizing this new era of digitization in our airports lets all parties benefit and save precious funds.

The Blueprint Is Already in the Skies