Georgian Bay Leisure Distributors Ltd., 2022 CanLII 139059 (CA CITT) (“Georgian Bay”)is a CITT case highlighting the complexities of tariff classification when importing goods to Canada.!
Background
When importing commercial goods to Canada, there are three things any importer needs to address from a customs compliance perspective:
As discussed here and here, Canada has one of the most protectionist agricultural product sectors in the world. Indeed, we have import restrictions and incredibly high tariffs on many basic groceries like cheese, eggs and poultry – all leading to fuel inflation in Canada today, and continuing disputes with countries like the US and New Zealand over our protectionist approach.
This affects consumer and commercial importers of these products, with our current government enforcing import restrictions through tariff rate quotas (“TRQs”).