Written in the early 1980s when federal and provincial governments clashed determinedly over the Constitution, this study focuses on the many barriers that impeded interprovincial trade in the country's most valuable resource--its food.
The authors identified several areas where trade was restrained through a variety of non-tariff mechanisms, including marketing boards, discretionary subsidies, liquor control regulations, provincial procurement policies and packaging and labelling. Based on interviews with government officials, academics and business executives, the book argued that interprovincial and federal-provincial economic links were in decline, threatening the political links that defined the nation.
The Splintered Market offered a forceful argument against the economic and political "balkanization" of Canada in the early 1980s.

RICHARD HAACK is a commodity market analyst.

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ROBERT SHAPIRO is a lawyer specializing in the food and agriculture sectors.

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DAVID HUGHES is an agricultural economist, formerly with Agriculture Canada.

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