EDC’s vision and strategy

EDC’s vision is to be the leader in helping every Canadian company go, grow and succeed internationally. Everything we do is grounded in our vision – it helps us set priorities and gives direction to our growth.

In practical terms, it’s about providing support for more exporters, at every stage of their journey – from encouraging and equipping them to take their first international steps, to offering the financial solutions needed to accelerate their growth, to helping them diversify into fast-growing global markets and sectors.

Our five-year corporate strategy, which enters its final year in 2020, is geared to becoming more relevant to more Canadian companies, as measured by the number of customers served. Having averaged about 7,500 customers a year in the previous decade, we set out in 2015 to significantly increase that number and put in place strategies and initiatives to support the growth.

As we consider our future strategy, we plan to go beyond simply measuring relevance by the number of customers served to considering the success our customers have achieved and, by extension, the impact we’ve had on Canada’s trade competitiveness.

Current strategic priorities include the following:

Helping more Canadian companies go, grow and succeed

We’re increasing the number of companies served by promoting the benefits of exporting through new and different channels, offering unique financial solutions and international trade connections, and growing our range of products and services aimed at helping SMEs overcome export challenges.

Supporting the Government of Canada’s priorities

EDC’s strategy aligns with the Government’s trade agenda, which includes expanding and diversifying Canadian exports to new and emerging markets, and advancing Canada’s progressive and inclusive interest abroad.

Internal transformation

Three large-scale transformation initiatives are enabling our growth: (1) The continued enterprise risk management (ERM) transformation was our number one priority in 2019 as we sought to build the culture and capabilities needed to support Canadian companies as they venture into higher-risk markets. (2) Our digital transformation is improving the customer experience and becoming the most scalable way for EDC to deliver relevant content, solutions and services to a broader range of customers. (3) Our credit insurance transformation is moving our full portfolio of credit insurance products online, and is particularly valuable to SMEs looking to protect themselves from risks of non-payment by their international customers. Credit insurance is often the first EDC product that exporters use.

CSR strategy

We adopted a new CSR vision and strategic framework in 2018, and have since been reshaping key policies that govern our conduct regarding human rights, our impact on climate and our transparency and disclosure of information.

Financial sustainability

Our ability to deploy lending and insurance solutions to Canadian exporters is dependent on our commitment to sound financial management. EDC is financially self-sustaining and does not receive parliamentary appropriations. The income that we generate is applied directly against Canada’s fiscal accounts and it strengthens our capital base.

We achieve self-sustainability by operating on commercial principles and taking a disciplined approach to all financial matters. This means we must be able to remain solvent under stressed scenarios, keep a well-capitalized balance sheet and adequate liquidity to meet our financial commitments, and have sufficient reserves against future losses. All initiatives within EDC’s business strategy must be evaluated to ensure they reflect our commitment to fiscal prudence and our long-term viability.