Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada


The COVID-19 pandemic had a deep impact on the Canadian economy, leading it into a recession. The governments' social distancing rules had the effect of limiting economic activity in the country. Companies started considering mass-layoffs of workers, which was largely prevented by the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy. But despite these efforts, Canada's unemployment rate was 13.5% in May 2020, the highest it has been since 1976.
Many large-scale events that planned to take place in 2020 in Canada were canceled or delayed. This includes all major sporting and artistic events. Canada's tourism and air travel sectors were hit especially hard due to travel restrictions. Some farmers feared a labour shortfall and bankruptcy.
The COVID-19 affected consumer behaviors. In the early stages of the pandemic, Canadian grocery stores were the site of large-scale panic buying which lead to many empty shelves. By the end of March, most stores were closed to walk-in customers with the exception of grocery stores and pharmacies, which implemented strong social distancing rules in their premises. These rules were also implemented in other Canadian businesses as they began to re-open in the following months.

Large event cancellations

Most event cancellations occurred on or after March 12, when several provinces implemented bans on gatherings of 250 or more people. The leadership contests of the Conservative Party of Canada, Green Party of British Columbia, Quebec Liberal Party and Parti Québécois were postponed.

Agricultural sector

In April 2020, there were concerns afoot that, because of the federal closure of all external borders, the farm sector would have difficulty with a labour shortfall, as seasonal farm workers would be absent.
In May, many ag producers were worried about going bankrupt, this in spite of the announcement on May 5 of a $252 million federal ag subsidy programme. The Canadian Federation of Agriculture had called one week earlier for a $2.6 billion subsidy but were disappointed.

Health and travel insurance

At least one insurance carrier announced that it was cutting back on insurance coverage for Canadians abroad. On March 15, 2020, RSA Canada announced that trip cancellation, interruption, and emergency medical coverage was now limited to 10 days from the federal government's announcement on March 13, 2020, urging Canadians not to travel internationally.

Layoffs

has frozen all hiring and is offering voluntary departure packages to employees, with the goal of cutting 12 percent of its total capacity. Air Canada announced on March 20 that it will lay off 5,000 of its staff. On March 20, the federal government announced a dramatic increase in applications to unemployment insurance, with over 500,000 Canadians applying in a single week. By March 22, the figure was adjusted to nearly one million Canadians applying in a single week. And by April 2, jobless claims in Canada reached around 2.13 million, representing roughly 11 percent of the labour force. On April 6, the Canadian government said that 3.18 million Canadians applied for unemployment benefits, with around 795,000 applying on April 6 alone. The survey from the Angus Reid Institute found that 44 percent of Canadian households have experienced some type of job loss. On April 13, the number of applications for emergency benefits due to the pandemic reached 6 million – this number "includes those who applied through the employment insurance process."

Business practices

Initially, fast casual restaurants such as Starbucks and Tim Hortons maintained service, but suspended the allowable use of reusable cups by patrons. Tim Hortons simultaneously altered its popular "Roll up the Rim to Win" promotion to exclude physical cups. In compliance with or ahead of local mandates, some national restaurant chains have since suspended in-store dining and seating, in favour of take-out and delivery service only. Although McDonald's Canada and Wendy's Canada have both decided to close their dining rooms entirely at most locations, and only offer drive-through and delivery.
Shopify cancelled its Shopify Unite conference, which was scheduled to occur from May 6 to 9 in Toronto.
The major movie theatre chains Cineplex Entertainment and Landmark initially restricted the capacity of their individual cinema auditoriums by half. Both chains have since closed all locations until further notice.

Airline sector

cancelled all flights to Beijing, Shanghai, and Rome; and cut back on flights to Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Seoul.
WestJet announced on March 16 that all international flights, including to the US, will be suspended by March 22.
On March 18, Porter Airlines announced that it would suspend all flights until June.
Also on March 18, Air Canada announced that by April 1 all international flights will be suspended, with only six overseas airports and thirteen United States airports being served. The six connections at London, Paris, Frankfurt, Delhi, Tokyo and Hong Kong airports would allow Canadians to return home. These measures are expected to last until at least April 30.
Air Canada announced because of the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy, it would re-hire backdated to 15 March 16,000 airline staff that were laid off due to the pandemic.
On April 21, Air Canada announced a suspension of all scheduled flights to the U.S. from April 27 to May 22, "subject to any further government restrictions beyond that date."
On May 14, Lufthansa said it would resume flights between Toronto and Frankfurt as of June 3. The airline plans three weekly flights between the cities, and may add Vancouver and Montreal to its post-lockdown rota later on this summer. Flights are banned on all international non-essential travel between Canada and the European Union since March 17, but citizens are allowed to return to either location. Prior to the pandemic, Lufthansa operated 64 weekly flights between the two countries. The airline's recovery plans involve high-density cargo to replace paying customers. The Lufthansa Group airlines now require all passengers to wear a mask while aboard.

Tourism and festivals

Almost all tourist sites have been closed or reduced due to the pandemic. Many summer festivals and events were cancelled including the Canadian National Exhibition and Canadian International Air Show, Calgary Stampede, Celebration of Light fireworks festival, and Pacific National Exhibition. Pride events planned to take place across the country were changed to take place virtually.

Casinos and gaming

Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, and Saskatchewan have ordered the closure of all casinos until further notice. Société des casinos du Québec also closed all four of its casinos. Great Canadian Gaming voluntarily closed its 10 locations in BC, and 3 in the Atlantic provinces. The Atlantic Lottery and Loto-Québec also suspended and disabled their video lottery terminals starting March 16.

Stock market

The Toronto Stock Exchange was affected strongly by the 2020 stock market crash, with an overall 12 percent decline on March 12 of the S&P/TSX Composite Index, its biggest single-day decline since 1940, twice triggering market circuit breakers. The week of March 9–13 was the TSX's worst week on record. The fall, which capped two weeks of steady declines, was exacerbated by an oil output war between Russia and Saudi Arabia.
The S&P/TSX Composite Index lost another 10 percent on March 16, causing trading to halt a 3rd time in a span of eight days. The index closed at 12,360.40 points on March 16, down 31 percent from before the crash at 17,944 recorded on February 20. By April 17, the index had recovered some of its losses, closing at 14,359.98, still down 20 percent from the February 20 close.

Sports

All professional and university sports leagues with Canadian teams have suspended their seasons from March 13 onward. This includes the National Hockey League, the Canadian Hockey League, Hockey Canada, the Canadian Junior Hockey League, U Sports ice hockey, the National Basketball Association, Major League Baseball, Major League Soccer, the Canadian Premier League, the Canadian Soccer Association, and the CONCACAF Champions League. On March 18, the CHL's leagues announced that they would cancel the remainder of their regular seasons. All playoffs and the 2020 Memorial Cup were subsequently cancelled March 23. On April 8, the National Lacrosse League also cancelled the rest of their regular season, with postponement of the playoffs. The Canadian Football League delayed its 2020 season no earlier than September 2020, and announced that the 108th Grey Cup festivities in Regina had been cancelled. U Sports and most of its conferences have cancelled all fall-semester university athletics competition for the 2020-21 season.
Golf was one of the first sports to reopen in Canada. However, the national amateur and professional golf championships were all cancelled including the PGA Tour Canada, Canadian Open, Canadian Women's Open and the Canadian Amateur. Selected provincial competitions went ahead but there were no spectators and no-touch golf was in effect.
There will be no national champions crowned in five-pin bowling in 2020. Bowl Canada, the Canadian Five Pin Bowler's Association and the Master Bowlers all cancelled their national finals. The only events that are still deferred are run by the Western Canadian Bowling Tour. Government health orders shut down bowling alleys during the prime competitive season which scrapped most of the provincial championships.
Cancelled international sports events in Canada include the 2020 World Women's Curling Championship, the 2020 World Figure Skating Championships, the 2020 Women's Ice Hockey World Championships, and the 2020 Sprint Tour and 2020 World Cup Finals of the FIS Cross-Country World Cup. Cancelled national competitions include the 2020 Arctic Winter Games and Nordiq Canada's Canadian Ski Championships.
On April 11, Tennis Canada cancelled the 2020 Canadian Open women's tournament in Montreal, pursuant to a request by the Quebec government for all cultural events, festivals, and sporting events be cancelled through August, although the men's tournament was still tentatively scheduled to be played in Toronto as scheduled. On June 17, the event was cancelled and postponed in full to 2021.
On July 2, 2020, the federal government approved appropriate exceptions to allow the Toronto Blue Jays to conduct training camps at their home field of Rogers Centre, although the ability to play home games at the site is still uncertain.
On July 10, the NHL announced that Edmonton and Toronto would host the 2020 Stanley Cup playoffs in centralized, quarantined environments, beginning August 1. Edmonton and Toronto will host the early rounds of the Western Conference and Eastern Conference teams respectively, while Edmonton will host both conference championships and the Stanley Cup finals. The two were among three Canadian cities on a shortlist of potential sites, with Vancouver having dropped out over disagreements with BC's health minister over protocols in the event of a positive case within the "hub" environment. A spike of cases in Nevada led to Edmonton and Toronto being listed as overall front-runners over Las Vegas by early-July.

Media and arts

Many news websites have dropped their paywalls for material related to the pandemic, including The Globe and Mail and all Postmedia sites. Postmedia subsequently dropped its paywalls for all content for April 2020.
Public broadcaster CBC temporarily replaced its local evening newscasts with a simulcast from CBC News Network combining content from local and national journalists from across the country, a decision that was criticized by the Premier of Prince Edward Island Dennis King, as CBC News: Compass is the province's only local daily television news program. By the end of March, however, local news service began to be restored in most markets.
CBC Radio One also temporarily suspended production of its arts and entertainment magazine series Q, in order to provide an extended daily broadcast of its morning news series The Current, while CBC Music shifted to programming exclusively Canadian music to help support artists impacted by the cancellations of concert tours and the Juno Awards. CBC Television also launched a number of special short-run series during the pandemic to deal with disruptions in its regular schedule, including Movie Night in Canada to broadcast feature films in lieu of Hockey Night in Canada; What're You At? with Tom Power, a Sunday evening talk show which will see Tom Power remotely interview both celebrities and ordinary Canadians; and Hot Docs at Home, a Thursday night series which will broadcast several feature documentary films which had been slated to premiere at the cancelled Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival.
Cancelled cultural events include such awards ceremonies as the 2020 Juno Awards, scheduled to have been in Saskatoon on March 15, the 8th Canadian Screen Awards, the 15th Canadian Folk Music Awards, the Artis Awards and the 22nd Quebec Cinema Awards.
Festival cancellations or postponements include the Hot Docs Canadian International Documentary Festival, originally planned in Toronto from April 30 to May 10, the Inside Out Film and Video Festival, originally planned for late May but now rescheduled to October, and Montreal's, which will now be presented online. CBC Radio's Canada Reads book competition, scheduled for the week of March 16, was also postponed.
Canada's national museums in Ottawa cancelled all scheduled events and exhibits, and closed indefinitely on March 14. Almost all local museums, art galleries, theatres, and other performance venues across the country have also closed indefinitely.
The National Arts Centre launched #CanadaPerforms, a $100,000 fund that would pay Canadian musicians $1,000 to perform a livestreamed home concert on Facebook during the crisis. The initiative launched on March 19 with a concert by Jim Cuddy, with other artists already scheduled to perform including Serena Ryder, William Prince, Irish Mythen, Erin Costelo and Whitehorse.
The eighth season of the Global series Big Brother Canada abruptly ended production on March 24, 2020 due to the Ontario government's mandatory 14-day closure of all non-essential workplaces. There was no winner, with the prize money subsequently donated to charities responding to COVID-19.
On April 26, nearly all Canadian television networks in both English and French collaborated on the multiplatform special Stronger Together, Tous Ensemble, which featured home-recorded messages and musical performances from Canadian celebrities, as a benefit for Food Banks Canada. The special attracted 11.5 million viewers, becoming the most-watched non-sports broadcast in the history of Canadian television, and concluded with the broadcast premiere of a cover of Bill Withers's song "Lean on Me", recorded by an ad hoc supergroup of Canadian musicians as a fundraiser for the Canadian Red Cross. Participating artists included Bryan Adams, Jann Arden, Justin Bieber, Michael Bublé, Fefe Dobson, Scott Helman, Shawn Hook, Avril Lavigne, Geddy Lee, Marie-Mai, Sarah McLachlan, Johnny Orlando, Josh Ramsay, Buffy Sainte-Marie, Tyler Shaw, Walk Off the Earth and Donovan Woods.
During an interview on Breakfast Television, Simon Cowell announced a spin-off version of the former show Canada's Got Talent called Canadian Family's Got Talent carried out virtually by Citytv. The contest, presented by Canadian Tire, ran from April 27 to May 26, and was judged by Cowell alongside hosts Dina Pugliese and Devo Brown. The contest was won by Toronto-based singing trio CZN.