The Russians will have to do without snowmobiles and Quebec hockey jerseys. Two major local companies, BRP and SP Apparel, confirmed Thursday to pause their exports in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine.
Posted at 3:12 p.m.
“Over the past few weeks and days, we have been following the situation in Eastern Europe very closely,” said Biliana Necheva, senior media relations advisor at BRP, by email. Given the instability of the current situation and trade complexities, we are temporarily ceasing the export of our products to Russia. »
Bombardier Recreational Products (BRP), which produces the Ski-Doo, Sea-Doo and Can-Am, has been in Russia for about 30 years. This country was less than a decade ago its third largest market. The situation changed dramatically from 2014.
“Since the conflict in Crimea and the international sanctions that followed, BRP sales in Russia now represent less than 5% of our total sales,” explains Mr.me Necheva. BRP has an office in Saint Petersburg, around forty employees and a network of around one hundred dealerships.
No new order
On the side of SP Clothing, the world’s largest manufacturer of hockey jerseys which notably supplies the teams of the National Hockey League, international competitions and certain teams of the Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) in Russia, exports to the latter countries are stopped.
“For the moment, I have no order this year, explained Steve Bérard, president and owner of the Granby company. Normally, we are in development, these are orders that will arrive later this summer. I won’t produce anything, we won’t touch that: I asked the whole team not to start a new project. »
These two companies join others in Canada who have recently announced the suspension of their exports to Russia, including McCain Food and Canada Goose. Bombardier, for its part, announced that it would continue to sell its planes there, avoiding dealing with customers personally targeted by the sanctions.
Others, such as Alimentation Couche-Tard which set up in Russia in 2012 with the acquisition of 33 service stations and Opsens which has been selling its fiber optic sensors there for the oil industry since 2013, have not yet announced a decision in this regard. Neither of these last two companies responded to requests from The Press.
On Wednesday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he was open to offering financial compensation to Canadian companies that see their operations affected by the sanctions. According to Global Affairs’ annual trade report, goods and services exported by Canada to Russia in 2020 reached $617 million, while imports totaled $1.2 billion. By comparison, Canadian exports to the United States, by far the largest customer, reached $361.5 billion that year.
Globally, the invasion of Ukraine has led major multinationals to leave Russia or suspend their operations there. Apple, Ford, Exxon and Boeing, among others, have recently made such announcements.