The Canadian Taxpayers Federation says the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency is spending its money in the wrong place and should be shut down.

It released a study Tuesday that said much of the job-creation money ACOA has handed out over the past 10 years has gone to government agencies, unions, and big business.

"While the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency claims that 60% of all jobs in Atlantic Canada are created by small business, the funding pattern is absolutely the reverse," said Federation spokesperson Walter Robinson.

"Just over four per cent of the recipients, 475 recipients, received a lion's share, 58% of the funds."

The Federation named the Tourism Industry Association of P.E.I. as one of the top 475 grant recipients, saying it received $12.9 million over the past decade.

However an ACOA official, Peter Esty, said the Prince Edward Island group administered the money that all four Atlantic provinces used for tourism marketing.

"All the provincial governments and all the four provincial tourism industry associations have banded together to create efficiencies in marketing and product development," he said.

Robinson said that's exactly the kind of spending the Taxpayers Federation wants the government to stop.

He said it doesn't make sense for taxpayers' money to filtered through ACOA, and then through groups like the Tourism Industry Association, before it finally starts creating jobs.