Canada

Canada was slowly colonized by European settlers throughout the 16th and 17th centuries. They were particularly interested in the abundance of natural resources available for export, including fish, fur, lumber, agricultural products, and minerals. Aided by the National Policy (1879), which placed high tariffs on imported goods and facilitated the building of a trans-national railroad, central Canada quickly became the manufacturing center of Canada, and the periphery regions remained highly dependent on resource extraction.

Although elements of the Industrial Revolution were present in Canada by the 1850s, Canada's industrial revolution did not take off until the 1880s. Much of the emerging industrial economy was located in southern Ontario. By the 1930s, this region was dominated by the growing automotive industry, which aided the development of related industries such as steel, rubber, and glass. Canada entered into the Auto Pact agreement with the United States in 1964, which removed tariffs on automobiles and automotive parts in exchange for a guarantee that automobile production in Canada would not fall below 1964 levels and that the production to sales ratio would remain the same. This agreement provided considerable growth for the industry, allowing it to overtake pulp and paper as Canada's most important industry. Canada entered into a free trade agreement with the United States in 1989, which was expanded to include Mexico in 1994. Since then, many industries—automotive, textiles, and pulp and paper—have been adversely affected. Many of the affected communities have attempted to rebrand themselves as part of the knowledge economy. Canada also has free trade agreement with Israel, Jordan, and six counties in Central and South America. Since the 1970s, the oil industry has been one of Canada's leading industries, especially in the province of Alberta. Although much of Canada's early economic history was centered on the goods-producing sector—especially resource extraction and manufacturing—the service sector has grown rapidly since the 1970s and accounts for roughly three-quarters of all employment in Canada.