The report found B.C. could not have built the new ferries at existing shipyards as quickly, but sending work overseas has long-term costs.
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Four new B.C. Ferries vessels will be built in China, but a new report says the project could have generated $1.5 billion in additional economic activity in Canada, with most of the benefit staying in the province.
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The report, prepared by economic consulting firm QEDinc, estimates that building four new Summit-class ferries domestically would have generated more than 10,000 job-years and $413 million in additional government revenue from associated taxes.
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In May 2025, B.C. Ferries awarded a contract to China Merchants Industry Weihai Shipyards to build the vessels, which the corporation hopes to have operational by 2029.
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“It’s incomprehensible that a major publicly-funded purchase like this would simply be hived off to China because it’s easier and possibly cheaper,” said economist Jim Stanford, an author of the report.
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Stanford said it’s hard to compare the costs because B.C. Ferries hasn’t disclosed the cost of its contract.
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“They’ve been keeping us in the dark.”
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B.C. Ferries told Postmedia News that two Canadian shipyards made it through the pre-qualification process for the new ferries, but neither put in a final bid.
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“With our oldest major vessels approaching the end of their service lives, we could not defer their replacement while waiting for domestic capacity to develop,” it said in an email statement Saturday.
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The report acknowledges that B.C. could not have built the new ferries at existing shipyards on the same timeline.
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But it argues that years of sending B.C. Ferries work overseas have helped weaken the province’s shipbuilding capacity, creating a cycle in which fewer local contracts meant less incentive for shipyards to invest in facilities, equipment and skilled workers. That, in turn, made B.C. less competitive for future contracts.
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“The barrier is simply a lack of foresight and planning by government and B.C. Ferries, and an overly narrow perspective on minimizing immediate purchase costs in public procurement decisions,” the report reads.
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B.C. had built the majority of its B.C. Ferries vessels locally before the provincial government moved to open tendering internationally in 2002.
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Of 11 vessels added to the fleet between 2003 and 2018, only two were built in B.C., the report says. Major vessels were constructed in Germany, Poland and Romania. Ten Island-class vessels have also been built in Romania since 2019.
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Still, the province has a significant shipbuilding industry, the report says. B.C. accounts for about 40 per cent of Canada’s shipbuilding jobs and the industry generated about $4.5 billion in sales in 2025, but much of the province’s existing large-scale shipyard capacity is tied up in federal work.
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The report was commissioned by the Build Them Here Shipbuilding Coalition, which was launched in August and includes more than 15 unions representing more than 7,000 shipbuilding and marine workers in B.C., along with industry representatives.
