Amazon fires back at critics in Canada warehouse flap |
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Amazon fires back at critics in Canada warehouse flap
Amazon.com's plans for a warehouse in Canada have stirred a lively debate up north, with the Canadian Booksellers Association warning that Amazon's presence "will detrimentally affect independent businesses and would raise serious concerns over the protection of our cultural industries."
Now an Amazon executive is firing back, calling such claims "preposterous." Paul Misener, Amazon's vice president of global public policy, told The Globe & Mail that Amazon has spent "tens of thousands of dollars" supporting Canadian culture since launching the Canadian version of its website in 2002.
The Globe & Mail reports:
Mr. Misener took on the Canadian Booksellers Association for claiming that a U.S.-based company couldn't effectively promote Canada's culture.
“At some level it seems preposterous that that claim could be made, especially given our track record of eight years serving Canadian customers and authors and publishers,” Mr. Misener said in an interview. “To claim that somehow an American company can't help Canadian culture is just proved wrong by the facts.”
Amazon goes further than other Canadian booksellers by promoting domestic books beyond its borders, he said. Customers in more than 170 countries, ranging from China to Sweden, ordered books at Amazon.ca last year, he said. “I don't think anybody is doing anything near this to help disseminate Canadian cultural products globally.”
When it launched Amazon.ca, the web retailer switched to carrying Canadian versions of books rather than the U.S. publications which “cut out the Canadian publishers,” Mr. Misener noted.
The issue here isn't allowing Amazon to sell books and other products in Canada — the online retail giant has been doing that for years — but letting Amazon establish a physical footprint in the country with a warehouse to ship and store goods.
The Globe & Mail cites an unnamed senior Canadian official as saying the government is "leaning toward" allowing Amazon to set up a warehouse, which Amazon calls a fulfillment center. But the report said no final decision has been made.
Here's the letter (pdf, 2 pages) that the Canadian Booksellers Association sent to Canadian Heritage Minister James Moore.
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