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A national industry group is urging manufacturers hard hit by dropping international trade and a strong loonie to hook up with materials-hungry Alberta oilpatch companies in a kind of online introduction service for Canadian corporations.
Alberta companies that make the equipment to extract crude from the oilsands can't build their products fast enough and the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters believes it has a perfect fit to fill that gap - it will launch its ICosmos.ca web portal Friday, aimed at linking oilsands producers with manufacturers who can build the needed equipment.
The site will contain detailed information about potential suppliers, including their areas of expertise and their ability to handle large projects. The group is also organizing a national conference in Edmonton that will focus on interprovincial co-operation for oilsands contracts.
The stakes are high for Canadian manufacturers, particularly those in eastern Canada. The oilsands are thought to contain as much as 2.5 trillion barrels of crude, which could potentially satisfy North American needs for decades. The national manufacturers group estimates there is much as $100-billion worth of projects on the go or in the planning stages. The oilsands region, which is twice the size of New Brunswick, is also expected to generate $700 billion in economic activity in the coming years.
For a manufacturing industry that has lost 224,000 jobs since 2002, the booming Alberta oilpatch, and the oilsands in particular, represents a vital lifeline.
Although Canadian manufacturers have struggled to compete with cheap foreign imports and a high Canadian dollar, the urgent need for drills, catwalks, storage tanks, pipes and refinery components in Alberta is forcing a made-in-Canada solution, some companies say.
"The fabrication shops here are backed up six to eight months, which has forced us to look elsewhere," Canrig Canada's Alex Mieszkowski said from the company's Calgary office.
The company, which builds equipment used in the oilsands and other global oil-producing areas, has some of its components made in New Brunswick, Ontario and Nova Scotia, Mieszkowski said.
The fabrication shops in New Brunswick, he said, charge up to $30 less per hour than some Alberta shops.
John Bourque of Saint John, N.B. company Bourque Industrial Ltd. travelled to Edmonton in the spring to promote his province's metal works companies.
"As far as the eye could see, it was property after property of construction," he said. "It was just amazing."
Bourque has begun to bid on Alberta contracts and expects the rest of the country to follow suit once the portal begins to gain traction.
"With our trip, you're talking about 23 companies," he said. "Now, it's going to be hundreds of companies."
Jayson Myers, vice-president of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters, said his group has organized meetings across Canada where oilsands suppliers hook up with business groups to outline how companies can tap into the oilpatch. Ontario, Quebec and British Columbia officials have thrown their support behind the idea.
Myers said companies outside Alberta are in a perfect position to capitalize on oilsands activity, since they don't face similar labour shortages.
"Alberta suppliers can't keep pace, which is forcing them to look for partners," he said.
The main challenge for eastern companies that supply the automotive industry, Myers said, is to consider how to ship their products west rather than south to the United States.
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