About the Project

The APF Canada Investment Monitor analyzes and reports on Canada’s two-way investment relations with the Asia Pacific.

The Asia Pacific – home to many of the world's most dynamic and fastest growing economies – boasts unprecedented opportunities for foreign investment in a number of key markets, both for Canada to receive foreign investment, and for Canadian investors to invest abroad.

It is critical for private and public sector stakeholders to seize these opportunities, as observers forecast that the Asia Pacific will continue to cement its position as the driver of the new global economy over the next 30 years. Ensuring successful engagement requires a nuanced understanding of the Canada-Asia trade and investment landscape – as well as the political and security issues that impact this landscape – above and beyond what is offered by official statistics.

To catalyze this success, the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada (APF Canada) operates the APF Canada Investment Monitor: now the primary hub for governments, economic agencies, business leaders, academics, media, civil society and the Canadian public to better understand Canada’s two-way investment relations with the Asia Pacific. The APF Canada Investment Monitor is more comprehensive and geographically broad than any other Canada-Asia investment tracker available.

Our dedicated Business Asia research team uses a wide range of sources to generate the APF Canada Investment Monitor, which includes greenfield investments, asset purchases, equity investment, mergers, acquisitions, joint ventures and others, from 2003 to present. 

The project addresses the limitations in official statistics and other investment tracking services by offering detailed information related to Canada-Asia investments drawn from APF Canada’s own unique legacy data collected over more than a decade and from other public sources.

This ongoing project's content has included a dedicated annual report series on Asia Pacific investment in Canada (launched in 2017), monitoring inward foreign direct investment (FDI) from Asia Pacific in Canada; Canadian investment in the Asia Pacific (launched in April 2018), monitoring outward FDI from Canada in the Asia Pacific; Canadian-Asia Pacific investments at the city-level (launched in April 2019), monitoring FDI two-way investment relations between Canadian and Asia Pacific cities; and the interplay between Canada's free trade agreements and two-way investment relationships in the Asia Pacific (launched in April 2020).

Since 2022, the Foundation has been releasing sectoral reports focused on two-way investment flows between Canada and Asia Pacific in specific industrial sectors.

More information about the project is available on our Methodology and Glossary page and our FAQs page.