POLITICS & POLICIES

FriendsofGreenbelt

Friends of the Greenbelt’s Next Growth Phase

Since its creation in 2005, Ontario’s Greenbelt has become a renowned example of how to protect natural and rural environments in a rapidly urbanizing world. To foster the vitality of more than 725,000 hectares of green space (nearly 50 per cent of which is farmland) surrounding the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), the Friends of the Greenbelt Foundation financially supports projects […]

Resilience Jar | nik harron

Bouncing Back: How Resilience Leads to Better Health

Western medicine has made great strides in disease control in the last century. Diagnostic technologies and surgical procedures have advanced. Life expectancy has increased dramatically in most parts of the world. Antibiotics, improvements in sanitation and hygiene, as well as vaccines, have eradicated or reduced many of the world’s deadliest […]

Organics_Composite_Butterfly

Transcending the Organic/Conventional Divide

Elementary logic explains why the organic/conventional divide can’t explain very many outcomes. Organically grown lettuce doesn’t require toxic pesticides, but the plastic case that protects the lettuce on its trip from California to Nova Scotia is nowhere near as environmentally pure as the lettuce. Organically grown tomatoes may take up more […]

Prescription for Nature | nik harron

Editorial: The Ultimate Health Issue

I’VE LED the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment (CAPE) for 10 years now, and when I tell people about our organization one question I don’t often receive is: “Physicians for the Environment? What’s that?” The fact is, people get it: If you want folks to be healthy, you need […]

Canadian Rocky Mountain Ranch by Gonzalo Pineda Zuniga | Flickr

Bison: The Original Climate Change Activists

Originally published on Stephen Bocking’s blog Environment, History, Science. There’s a lot that can be said about the relations between environmental history and science. Historians often use scientific knowledge to figure out past environments – and science itself is a focus of historical study.