Archive for September, 2013
Loblaw-led coalition of grocers drive phase-out of sow stalls by 2022
As the country’s largest food retailer, Loblaw has a very real impact on what and how Canadians eat. Over the past several years, animal welfare has been on our corporate social responsibility agenda as part of our sourcing-with-integrity principle. We have spent time investigating the issues with various stakeholders; we’ve visited numerous farms, dedicated […]
The EU vs. Canada: Fixing factory farms by granting ‘The 5 Freedoms’
Globally, the number of land animals killed each year for food exceeds 65 billion, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. In the United States alone, 10 billion land animals are killed for food. In Canada, the number is 700 million. These statistics are unfathomable — a bit like the national debt. Standards for […]
Food animals: How Canada lags on humaness
Feed many families and you begin to feed a whole nation. To that end, the UN has declared 2014 The International Year of Family Farming. This family-by-family focus targets food self-sufficiency and large-scale benefits for developing countries. It aims to supply tools and know-how to small farmers — often women — so they can feed […]
The world’s healthiest
In 1883, the German Reichstag changed the course of human history when it passed the first modern health insurance law. While modest in scope by our standards, this piece of legislation was the first in a series of laws that ushered in the modern welfare state. Its original architect, Otto von Bismarck, was no friend […]
Drug wars: Uruguay’s new legal approach to marijuana
Last month, the lower house of Uruguay’s bicameral parliament voted to legalize the cultivation, distribution and sale of marijuana by adults in the country. The bill is almost certain to pass through the Senate and be signed into law by President Jose Mujica in coming weeks. If the bill passes, Uruguay will have the most […]
Changing migration management
Canada’s experience with managing migration has a long history, beginning with the powers assigned to provinces and the federal government under the Constitution Act of 1867. The federal government assumes leadership in the policy arena although Quebec has its own program and provinces are becoming more engaged in admissions. The most recent federal act, the […]
Immigration policy: ‘Committed to changes’
When I came home from working in Afghanistan in July 2009, Canada’s future looked uncertain. With hundreds of thousands out of work, with an economy sideswiped by market collapse right next door, Canada needed to get back on track. Just four short years later, the country is on a clear path to recovery. We have […]
Immigration: a policy gone wrong?
Canada’s immigration policy has often been praised as a model of how immigration programs should be managed. For many years, there was reason for this praise, but in the early part of the current decade, changes in the policy have led the federal government to lose control over the program. A brief history of how […]
Coming to Canada: An overview of immigration history
In Statistics Canada’s 2011 National Household Survey, the ethnic origin most often selected by respondents was Canadian, reported by more than 10.5 million people. It was followed by English, French, Scottish, Irish and German. Canada is often called a land of immigrants. And it is true that all Canadians are either from somewhere else, or […]
Less Martin Luther, more Milton Friedman needed in the Arab world
Martin Luther and Mohamed Bouazizi, the Tunisian fruit vendor who set himself ablaze, may not seem to have much in common, but they both dropped a spark into much accumulated dry kindling and timber. That set off blazes that led to sectarian violence, revolution, additional repression and war. Martin Luther’s nailing of his 95 […]
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