Group of Seven leaders are meeting next week in Kananaskis, Alta., against the backdrop of global trade uncertainty, geopolitical strife and elevated energy security concerns.

Political insiders, business leaders and analysts say this year’s summit comes at a critical economic juncture, both for Canada and its allies. While the stakes are high, observers also see a window for U.S. President Donald Trump to build a common front against China’s rising economic power, while pulling the U.S. and its trading partners off the destructive trade path his administration has put them on. 

“It’s a huge opportunity,” said Christopher Sands, director of the Center for Canadian Studies at Johns Hopkins University. “If he seizes it, great. If he doesn’t, we’re doomed.”

What it’s about

The G7 is made up of some of the wealthiest democracies in the world: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States, with a combined GDP of more than US$58 trillion this year. The European Union also attends the annual meetings, where members co-ordinate responses to global challenges, expanding beyond trade and economics to include security, climate change and human rights. 

What it’s also about

It’s a chance for Prime Minister Mark Carney and his new Liberal government to strut its stuff on the world stage. Carney chose to focus the gathering on themes that align with his key domestic priorities. Among them:

• Energy security: How things have changed. While recent G7 summits focused on decarbonization and lowering CO2 emissions—causes Carney championed—next week’s will likely focus on expanding oil and gas capacity to reduce Western nations’ dependence on Middle Eastern supply, Sands said. “That’s something in which the U.S. and Canada could be aligned, rather than competing with each other directly,” he said.
• Critical minerals: Based on a recent conversation with Carney, E3 Lithium CEO Chris Doornbos said the PM intends to raise the issue of critical minerals prices at the summit. Western leaders are seeking ways to reduce China’s dominance of the market, which has let the country’s mining companies flood the world with supply and undercut Western-based private firms. “The price problem is our biggest challenge,” Doornbos said on Tuesday at an event in Calgary.
• Artificial intelligence and quantum computing: Using these technologies “to unleash economic growth” is also on Carney’s list of priorities. A group chaired by the U.S. Treasury Department has called on G7 leaders to highlight cybersecurity and critical infrastructure protections as AI capability rapidly advances. 

Hallway conversations

U.S. President Donald Trump, who made Canada an early target in his global trade war, will be there. He and Carney last met at the White House in early May, but Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Dominic LeBlanc, who is also Carney’s point person on Canada-U.S. trade, has been negotiating a new economic and security agreement with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. Carney hopes to meet Trump on the sidelines, which could accelerate deal-making efforts.

Yet being with other world leaders is also a chance for Carney to diversify trade and strengthen partnerships outside the U.S.—even beyond the G7. Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum has RSVP’d yes. Her country, like Canada, is looking ahead to the review of the North American free-trade pact. So has Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who hopes to get another meeting with Trump. 

More controversially, Carney invited India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose government Canada has accused of orchestrating the 2023 killing of a Canadian Sikh activist in British Columbia. Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has reportedly declined an invitation. So has Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, who will instead meet President Vladimir Putin in Russia.

Hoping for ‘survival’

Success at a G7 summit is generally in the eye of the beholder. Gerald Butts, who was a senior adviser to former prime minister Justin Trudeau throughout most of Trump’s first term, is setting the bar low. “Some form of minor productive outcome would be great, but survival would be really good,” Butts said last month in Ottawa at the B7, a gathering of business leaders from G7 countries.

On that note, the G7 leaders are not even going to try to reach consensus in one joint communiqué—typically negotiated by governments over a series of months leading up to the main event. Carney has instead asked them to craft a series of short joint statements on specific, negotiated outcomes, senior government officials told reporters Thursday in a briefing provided on the condition that they not be named. They said the multiple-statement approach would allow deeper dives into each issue and outline concrete actions to be taken in areas such as critical minerals.

The elephant in the room

It could also be a way to avoid a repeat of what happened in 2018, when Canada last hosted the G7 summit in Charlevoix, Que. Things ended on a sour note when Trump abruptly announced on social media—while flying on Air Force One—that he was pulling out of the joint communiqué because he did not like what then-prime minister Justin Trudeau had told reporters about U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum.