Wastewater system manufacturers on wrong side of border

Canadian plants that make wastewater treatment equipment are suffering from Buy American policies in the U.S.

According to a report in the Financial Post, a Canadian manufacturer of brass fittings based in Cambridge, Ontario has been told to remove its pipe fittings from a project in Sacramento, California because they are stamped “made in Canada.” The report says the company, Cambridge Brass, stands to lose $1.5-million because it has to remove the material at its own expense. The company has reduced its workforce from 140 to 77 since earlier this year as a result of the Buy American policies.

The Financial Post report also cites an earlier case from May when pipe fittings manufactured by IPEX in Toronto had to be removed from the Camp Pendleton Marine base in California because the equipment was made in Canada.

Another Ontario company, Hayward Gordon, which makes industrial pumps, has been barred from bidding on U.S. products  and has switched manufacturing from three Canadian plants to the U.S. “in order to stay in business.” John Hayward from Hayward Gordon therefore disagrees with the position taken by the Ontario Pollution Control Equipment Association (OPCEA) which was reported in CCE Headline News on October 26, 2009. OPCEU holds that Ontario manufacturers of equipment don’t support a retaliatory “Buy Canadian” policy that has been put forward by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.

See www.financialpost.com/news-sectors/story.html?id-2193885

See also: Wastewater treatment manufacturers resist buy-Canadian policies