The 2000 edition of Shipping in Canada represents a departure from previous years. This is the first version that has been produced specifically for electronic viewing, with tables that are designed to fit one screen width and to be scrollable.

The content of the publication has also changed to focus solely on statistics related to the transportation of cargo by the marine mode. Financial and operating data on the Canadian domiciled water carriers will be available through an occasional publication, the Service bulletin - Surface and marine transport . The decision to release these statistics in separate publications is due to the fact that the data from the two surveys become available at different times of the year and, with the advent of electronic publishing, it was decided to no longer delay the release of one data set while the other was still in preparation.

The content of the tables contained in this edition has also changed both to fit the new format and to reflect the implementation of a new commodity classification known as the Standard Classification of Transported Goods (SCTG). ¹ Reference year 2000 is the first year that the marine cargo statistics were collected using this new commodity classification. Similarly the analytical text for the publication has been revised to reflect the new commodity classification and also to reflect in more fully the economic environment, particularly in the context of the Canadian port industry.