March was the transition month for tariff regime introduced by the Trump White House and the movement was clearly evident in manufacturing numbers for the month.
StatsCan has just released the March data showing the overall value of manufactured goods generated across the country fell about 1.5 percent, reversing a growth trend that was the highlight of the first two months of the year.
The growth figures generated in January and February can be traced to both buyers and sellers scrambling to make deals before the tariffs kicked in. Suppliers stocked their shelves with extra pre-tariff inventory but that began to drop in March as the rush began to ease.
Here in Saskatchewan, manufacturers saw their sales drop by one-percent compared to February. That was one of the better performances in the country but it capped off a twelve-month run that saw a 4-percent decline, one of the steeper pullbacks in the country.Locally factories in both Regina and Saskatoon saw even deeper reductions with Saskatoon posting the largest drop of all the major citi
