We are excited to announce that we are launching a new MAPLE Chapter in the great state of Colorado.
Colorado is a large and growing market with a population of nearly 6 million people and a GDP of over $380 billion. Canada is the largest export market for Colorado goods purchasing 15% of the goods that the state sells to the world totalling over $1.6 billion annually. Colorado exports another $1 billion in services to Canada annually.
And Colorado represents a key U.S. market for Canada too, importing nearly $5 billion in goods annually of which crude petroleum, wood and semi-finished wood products and softwood lumber are the top sectors. Colorado ranks highly as a place to do business with sector strengths in agriculture, mining, oil & gas, aerospace, advanced manufacturing and growing life science and high-tech sectors. Canada is represented with a Consulate General based in Denver led by Consul General Sylvain Fabi.
We are honoured to have Rob Mancey represent MAPLE as our Colorado Chapter Executive Director. Rob is a native of Ontario Canada and is the President and Chairman of the Denver-based Canada Colorado Association - the networking hub for Canadians and friends of Canada in the state since it was founded in the mid 1990's.
Rob is also the owner of a corporate housing franchise, AvenueWest Denver, which does business within the global mobility market as companies relocate employees both nationally and internationally. Working closely with Rob to launch and grow MAPLE Colorado is Canadian business executive and entrepreneur Derek Godfrey who recently relocated from Southern California to Colorado.
Our focus will be to complement the great work of the Consulate General of Canada, Colorado's economic development community and the Canada Colorado Association with our business networking and content focus. We are grateful for the welcome already extended to us by Consul General Sylvain Fabi and his team.
We are launching MAPLE Colorado with an inaugural event on the morning of November 8 at the law offices of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck in downtown Denver and we are honoured to welcome CG Sylvain Fabi as one of our featured speakers.
We will be sharing more information on our newest Chapter and Rob Mancey in a special newsletter in October and look for invitations to attend our event should you be in Denver.
We are excited for the additional Canada-U.S. networking, insights and storytelling that will come from the addition of MAPLE Colorado to our growing Canada-U.S. community and thank Rob Mancey for joining MAPLE as our newest Executive Director.
We extend a warm MAPLE welcome to Rob and Derek and, as always, thank you for your membership, participation and support.
