Archive for December, 2010

The oil sands: ‘The risks will endure’

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
The oil sands: ‘The risks will endure’

For more than 40 years, the Alberta oil sands mining industry has produced bitumen — a mixture of heavy hydrocarbons that can be upgraded and refined into petroleum products. With each barrel of product, the industry also produces more than 1.5 barrels of a persistent waste with the consistency of yogurt. Mature Fine Tailings (MFT), […]

Continue Reading

The all-important boreal forest

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
The all-important boreal forest

The number of birds breeding in North America’s boreal forest region is estimated at between 1.65 and 3 billion. Of these, landbirds are by far the most numerous, making up 97 percent of all birds breading there. The importance of the boreal forest region as a breeding ground for many bird groups is staggering. Estimates […]

Continue Reading

Danger in the Nursery

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Danger in the Nursery

The Canadian boreal forest is one of the world’s most important breeding areas for migratory birds, with 1 billion to 3 billion individual birds from at least 300 species known to regularly breed there. Approximately 30 percent of all shorebirds (7 million) and 30 percent of all landbirds (1 billion to 3 billion) that breed […]

Continue Reading

Lost legacy

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Lost legacy

Ontario’s official watcher of the woods says we need to plant billions of trees in southern Ontario alone. Why? Beginning in the 1990s, the province presided over a calamitous decline in the number of trees it plants every year. By Donna Jacobs When their sheer beauty is not enough, trees more than earn their right […]

Continue Reading

Winning ground — and holding it — in Afghanistan

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Winning ground — and holding it — in Afghanistan

Canadian Forces’ Chief of Defence Staff, General Walter Natynczyk, grew up in Winnipeg and had jobs as a paperboy and burger flipper before joining the military in 1975 and rising through the ranks to the top job, which he did in 2008. For the past four years, he has skipped Christmas with his family — all […]

Continue Reading

New Zealand: A vital trade partner for Canada

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
New Zealand: A vital trade partner for Canada

  Before I left New Zealand to take up my role as high commissioner in Canada, I spoke with my prime minister, the foreign minister and the head of the New Zealand foreign service. The theme from those conversations was how we could further strengthen our trade and economic relationship. While two-way trade in goods is significant, […]

Continue Reading

France invests in Canada’s success

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
France invests in Canada’s success

My focus, as ambassador of France to Canada, is to take the historic France-Canada partnership to a new level with enhanced strategic priorities. After Canada’s hosting of the G8 and G20 Summits, France took over the presidency of the G20 from South Korea in November and will take over the presidency of the G8 from […]

Continue Reading

Australia and New Zealand bid to host astronomy’s next big — one square kilometre — thing

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Australia and New Zealand bid to host astronomy’s next big — one square kilometre — thing

Star gazers, both professional and amateur, are closely following progress in one of the great global science projects of the 21st Century, the Square Kilometre Array (SKA). It’s a radio telescope being developed by a global collaboration of 20 countries, including Canada, and it promises to revolutionize our understanding of the universe through new insights […]

Continue Reading

Helping Ottawa’s ‘hidden poor’

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Helping Ottawa’s ‘hidden poor’

  When the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade asked Ottawa’s foreign diplomatic community to help out by donating food to its second annual food fair, the diplomats responded enthusiastically. Robert Peck, outgoing chief of protocol, explained that the idea was to create a lunchtime international buffet that would raise money to contribute to […]

Continue Reading

Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia: East confronts West

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia: East confronts West

The South Caucasus has historically been an arena of conflict. Much like the Balkans, it is a region where East and West meet and three great empires — the Russian, the Ottoman, and the Safavids (Persians) — clashed in earlier times. Today, it is a region where other fires burn. These are the fires of economic […]

Continue Reading