Good morning. For more than five years, Canadians have been dealing with a brutal car-theft epidemic. In 2025, more than 47,000 vehicles were stolen, and insurance claims totalled more than $900-million. In focus today, we imagine how just one change could solve this – and more. Also, we catch up on why BHP’s new Jansen potash mine is an example of how to build big. But first, the latest news:
In this image from video provided by NASA, Artemis II astronauts, from left, Reid Wiseman, Jeremy Hansen, Christina Koch and Victor Glover gather for an interview en route to the moon on Saturday.AP Third Party/The Associated Press
Up first
In the news
Space: Artemis II is about to break a record, and Canada’s Jeremy Hansen is cheered on by fellow astronauts
Trade: While the U.S. accuses Canada of not doing enough to halt import goods made with forced labour, trade statistics and the U.S.’s recent enforcement record suggests Washington faces gaps of its own
Infrastructure: A broken CN Rail bridge over Vancouver’s harbour is sapping Canada’s ambition to be an energy superpower
Telecom: Quebecor’s Freedom Mobile is taking advantage of a federal policy that gives them access to rivals’ networks. That mandated access is set to run out in 2030
Unlike in other countries, shipping manifest data is a black hole in Canada – the public does not know what goes in and out.Photo illustration by the Globe and Mail/iStockPhoto / Getty Images
In focus
The power of port data
Hi, I’m Ethan Lou, the opinion editor for Report on Business.
Today I bring you the latest in our Prosperity’s Path series, which examines solutions for Canada’s economic challenges. This week’s edition is written by James Orr, the chief product and technology officer with Arizona-based ImportGenius.
What’s most galling about Canada’s car theft problem is that these vehicles are passing through our own sovereign ports, right under our noses. One of the first essays in this series notes that Canada is a global top-10 exporter of stolen cars.
Yet each one of those shipping containers has a manifest attached to it that includes the name and address of its exporter, consignee (importer) and carrier, as well as its weight, value, and a description of contents. No container is loaded onto a ship without this information, which the Canada Border Services Agency collects electronically and updates on a daily basis.
In the United States, manifest-level shipping data is used to uncover human trafficking, counterfeit and contaminated goods, sanctions evasion, and all other manner of nefarious activity. There, the data is updated and publicly released daily, allowing anyone to do their own investigative work.
Orr writes that if that data were publicly released in Canada, it would allow media, insurers and others to investigate vehicle theft quickly and independently, which would both assist and pressure law enforcement to act.
And there’s more.
A recent Globe investigation examined public manifest-level data from India to expose the magnitude and severity of the global trade in fentanyl precursor chemicals.
That’s done with India’s data. Imagine what we can do with our own.
Last November, Prime Minister Mark Carney set a goal of doubling Canada’s non-U.S. exports from $300-billion to $600-billion by 2035. As part of those efforts, the government is investing $5-billion in domestic trade corridors to ensure Canadian goods move more efficiently to and through Canadian ports.
Orr argues that open shipping data is a catalyst for increased international trade, and for improved business productivity and efficiency, which are all things that Canada desperately needs right now.
Todd Hendry during an underground tour at BHP Jansen Potash Mine near Jansen, Sask., on Dec. 3, 2025.Heywood Yu/The Globe and Mail
ICYMI
Digging deep: Mining giant BHP’s new Jansen potash mine
Kate Helmore, our intrepid food policy and agriculture reporter, wrote the past weekend about the $18-billion Jansen potash mine: the biggest investment in the history of Saskatchewan and in the history of the world’s largest mining company, Australian juggernaut BHP Group Ltd.
This is part of our Think Big series, which looks at Canada’s most important nation-building energy and natural resource projects and the trade infrastructure needed to support them.
BHP is digging into the Prairie Evaporite Formation – the remains of an ancient inland sea – to extract a prized pink salt essential to global food production.
The potash from this mine will travel on 2,000 kilometres of rail to a port in British Columbia and then supply 10 per cent of the world’s demand by 2031.
“Jansen is the best undeveloped, now being developed resource out there,” said BHP chief executive officer Mike Henry. “And it’s going to be positioned very well in the markets over the decades to come.”
It is a lesson for Canada in how to build big.
Charted
Where’s the chocolate?
The definition of 'milk chocolate' for Canadian government standards means products must be at least 25 per cent cocoa solids.Photo illustration by Justin Poulsen/The Globe and Mail
The chocolate industry has been shifting dramatically, supercharged by the volatility of cocoa prices. Some manufacturers have made such drastic changes to their formulations, they no longer meet the Canadian government’s definition of “milk chocolate,” which requires the product to be at least 25 per cent cocoa solids. But because of labelling standards, it doesn’t take much tinkering to turn chocolate into “candy,” says Selvyn Simoes, a Toronto-based food scientist.
The good news is that some Canadian craft chocolate makers are still fighting the good fight.
Quoted
Blaming technology gets away from the real discussion that has to be had. Every time there’s a new technology, life goes faster, and we have to figure out a way to handle that.
— Oscar de Bos, co-author of Focus On-Off: Fuel Your Attention, Get More Done
The fight for our attention span: How these experts are trying to reclaim our focus from tech.
Up next
More files we’re following
Jump: Airline stocks are in a tailspin. So why is Air Canada outperforming?
Cut: Why cutting student grants may have long-term financial implications for young graduates.
Juke: AI is being used to prepare fake cases in immigration and asylum cases, federal officials say.
Next: Here’s what investors need to know for the week ahead.
Morning update
Global markets traded cautiously after U.S. President Donald Trump warned of “hell” for Iran unless it reopens the Strait of Hormuz by his self-imposed deadline, but a report of a push for a ceasefire appeared to ease some nerves
Wall Street futures edged into positive territory, while TSX futures followed sentiment higher.
Overseas, markets in Europe and Hong Kong were closed for a holiday. Japan’s Nikkei closed 0.55 per cent higher.
The Canadian dollar traded at 71.83 U.S. cents.