Whether it’s made of paper or pixels, the latest issue of Alternatives Journal is essential reading. Fresh from his legacy tour, David Suzuki reveals his inner-most thoughts; tar sands decrier Andrew Nikiforuk rips into “ethical oil;” the country’s top green writers tell us what they keep by their bedsides; we […]

Musicians have always drawn inspiration from the world around them, but what happens when that world is in trouble? For an increasing number of environmentally minded artists, their efforts are moving off-stage. Instead of writing green lyrics, they are setting up foundations, leading conservation drives, greening their tours, and changing […]

Education, like the Earth, is power. So in this issue of Alternatives, we combine our annual Education issue with a critical, alternative look at energy. University of Toronto professor and Toronto Star columnist Stephen Bede Scharper explores how our spiritual connection with energy can save us. Stephen Bocking provides a […]

Back in 1971, a young professor and an enthusiastic student at Trent University used electric typewriters, scissors and a lot of glue to produce the first edition of Alternatives Journal. They wanted to bring environmental protection and sustainability issues to a wider audience. Forty years later, the magazine stands as […]

A Boeing 777 has approximately 150,000 subsystems, although under ideal conditions only a few hundred are needed. If it crashed, its 400 passengers and flight crew might perish. When Canada’s cod fishery collapsed, it put 40,000 people out of work, devastated a $500-million-per-year industry and killed countless fish. The US […]

Despite the Internet and the iPad, it’s hard to imagine that books will give way altogether. And as for environmental books, there are more than ever before on bookstore shelves. As Stephen Bocking points out in this issue of Alternatives, information is important, but stories are essential. That is exactly […]

Just as parents aren’t supposed to favour any one of their children, it’s risky for editors to have a special attachment to a particular issue of their magazine. Nonetheless, this other-worldly issue is very dear to our editor-in-chief. From space travel to crop circles, rainmakers to junk building, swamis to […]

Initially intended to celebrate our nation’s spectacular biodiversity in 2010, the UN International Year of Biodiversity, Alternatives Journal could not help but highlight Ottawa’s spectacular failure to value these invaluable ecosystems. At the UN’s Convention on Biological Diversity in Nagoya, Japan, Canada may be blocking progress, rather than encouraging it.

Corn-based ethanol has become the latest target of the environmental and social justice movements, but let’s not throw out the jatropha, French-fry grease and pond scum with the maize. There is more to the biofuel debate than food-versus-fuel. Take a look inside this issue of Alternatives and you’ll discover that […]

20 books in review, 11 teasers, 2 excerpts, 3 essays, 13 staff favourites and 20 bestsellers. Featuring a whopping total of 77 new releases and timeless classics, our 2nd annual issue on environmental books is the ultimate guide to green reading.