The purpose of the 2026 edition of the Queen’s Institute on Trade Policy is to survey the impact of the United States’ new trade policy and China’s industrial policy and trade retaliation on Canada’s economy, explore the major policy issues raised by US and Chinese policies, and discuss the implications of these developments for Canada’s trade strategy.
CEO and Chief Economist, CSLS
Stephen Tapp is the CEO and Chief Economist at CSLS. He previously served as Chief Economist and SVP of Research, Data and Analytics at the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, where he launched and managed the Business Data Lab. Stephen is the President of the Canadian Association for Business Economics and a member of the Canadian Statistics Advisory Council.
He has 25 years of diverse experience at many of Canada’s top economic organizations, including Export Development Canada as the Deputy Chief Economist, the Bank of Canada, Parliamentary Budget Office, Finance Canada, academia, as well as think tanks, such as the Institute for Research on Public Policy and the C.D. Howe Institute. Stephen’s research was awarded the Purvis prize for Canadian economic policy and has been published in academic journals, including the Canadian Journal of Economics and Canadian Public Policy. He has a Ph.D. and M.A. in Economics from Queen’s University and an Honours B.A. in Economics with Distinction from Western University.
