The prohibition of single-use plastic products is crucial to Canada's plan of achieving zero plastic waste by 2030, but with the ban, environmentalists are growing increasingly concerned about the amount of paper packaging being used in its place. "We absolutely need to shift away from using plastics as much as we do, but trading in plastic pollution for deforestation and forest degradation is not the answer," Canopy founder and executive director Nicole Rycroft told CTV News. "We really need to make sure we do not create another environmental disaster."
Little Salmon Carmacks First Nation takes mine remediation complaints to water board
The Little Salmon Carmacks First Nation (LSCFN) claims that remediation work at an abandoned mine site in its traditional territory is only making things worse and so they are asking the Yukon Water Board to step in and change things. The subject of LSCFN’s complaint is the Mount Nansen mine site, a former gold and silver project located west of Carmacks that was heralded as an environmental disaster and an embarrassment to Canada, the Yukon and the mining firm involved when it was abandoned in 1999.
Barrick Gold’s ongoing chapter in Canadian mining history
In 2009, the then outgoing Chilean President Michelle Bachelet was awarded the Gold Insigne award by the Council of the Americas; the latter an American business organisation “promoting free trade, democracy and open markets throughout the Americas.” Bachelet is not a stranger to controversy when it comes to human rights violations. Despite her personal history and that of her family as victims of the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship, her legacy as president also included excessive use of the anti-terrorist law to criminalise the Indigenous Mapuche’s resistance against exploitation of their land and natural resources.
Drinking water impairment on St. Clair River close to being resolved
Thirty-four years ago, the St. Clair River was proclaimed an environmental disaster. Now, environmental and business groups are working to resolve one of the most intractable impairments to the river — restrictions on drinking water consumption or taste and odor problems with the water. Sheri Faust, president of the Friends of the St. Clair River, is hoping that enough progress can be made by 2022 to remove the impairment. On Oct. 19, the Friends hosted a Zoom presentation on the status of drinking water from the river. About 25 people tuned into the mini-conference.