Trade Corridors and North American Competitiveness

The North American economy is deeply intertwined thanks to a system of deeply integrated continental supply chain that connects production centers and distribution hubs across the continent's three countries: The US, Canada and Mexico. These supply chains are connected by a physical infrastructure of rails, road, pipelines and wires, ports, border crossings, as well as the more intangible system of regulations that affect these physical infrastructure. In some ways, this connection between the North American countries are deeper than in Europe. For one, the economic substructure of the three countries are deeply integrated. This is true since the North American continent shares energy markets, service the same customers with an array of financial services, use the same transportation modes, and converge in like standards of professional practice. Therefore, this "trade corridor" is not only connected physically by means of superhighways, but rather, they are linked through strategies conceived by groups of business and municipal government leaders. In the ever changing global trade, the need to improve this trade corridor is to focus more on border associations among the three countries, as well as of the organizations of governors, and trade corridors linking urban centers, organizations, regions, and more importantly, the entrepreneurial strategies that are shared between these organizations.