When I saw the picture of Athabasca Chipewyan First Nations Chief Allan Adam, his face half swollen, his skin bruised purple, and blood dripping down onto his collar, I was gutted.
I was already feeling unsteady from the chaos unfolding in our world. For me that chaos includes the constant adversity faced by Indigenous Peoples that I report on.
But, seeing a revered First Nations leader in this condition via the hands of law enforcement was a new and higher level of distressing.
Death and decay are winning in Canada's vast managed forest lands. And this victory is unleashing a rising flood of climate pollution. Put simply, our forests are dying and being cut down faster than they can grow back.
In 2018, the flood of CO2 pouring out of them reached record levels, at nearly a quarter billion tonnes of CO2 in a single year. That's more than Canada's once biggest climate pollution source — the oil and gas sector — emitted that year.
Across Canada, governments have suspended, delayed and cancelled environmental protection measures as the country grapples with COVID-19.
The changes started in Alberta, with Ontario following soon afterwards. Now, the federal government and most provinces have made changes related to environmental protection that they say are temporary.
The pandemic has shown the need to decommodify key sectors like housing
An “acronym soup of emergency benefits” — as economist David Macdonald puts it — has rolled out in Canada over the past two months. For many, it’s been tough to keep track of all the economic measures implemented since Canada’s response to the COVID-19 crisis began in mid-March.