Friday, 3 May 2024

Search Results for: environmental racism

The power–politics of pulp and paper: Health, environment and work in Pictou County

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This article by historian Lachlan MacKinnon was originally published on September 18, 2014 on the excellent ActiveHistory.ca site. We re-publish this now three-year old article because the gap between mill workers and Pictou County environmentalists the author identifies if anything has widened in the last three years. “Environmentalists must confront the fact that structural power is also wielded against other marginalized groups, such as industrial workers facing the threat of deindustrialization. In this recognition, we can hope to transcend narrow categories such as worker and environmentalist and achieve a broader-based support for systemic change.”

Neoliberalism 101

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Neoliberalism is a word you may well have heard at a rally or read in a newspaper, but what does it mean? Frequent contributor Alex Kronstein on all you ever wanted to know about neoliberalism but were afraid to ask. Turns out you knew its meaning all along.

Choppers and good cheer: Saving the Margaree watershed from Port Hawkesbury Paper and its allies

Unusual flooding, erosion, something has changed about the Margaree River in Cape Breton, writes Sam Ainsworth. When local residents start pointing it clear cutting of the Margaree watershed by Port Hawkesbury Paper, the company fights back. An expert report, the local salmon fishers association, politicians all get mobilized to argue that things in fact are just fine. Not so fast, writes Ainsworth, ” The Margaree could be a beacon of light in a very dark history for salmon in this province but the clearcutting must be drastically reduced.”

Labrador Riverkeeper visits Nova Scotia to raise alarm about Muskrat Falls

Roberta Benefiel, founding director of  Grand Riverkeeper, Labrador, is visiting Nova Scotia to remind us that for the people who live there Muskrat Falls is an environmental disaster that will poison traditional food sources and flood indigenous lands. She believes that through the Maritime Link this is Nova Scotia issue as well. “There may not be that many of us, but people do live here. We need to put a face to these people,” Benefiel tells the Nova Scotia Advocate.

Op-ed: Stephen McNeil needs to go beyond Harper targets on climate

Nova Scotia is one of Canada’s most emissions-intensive provinces. Peggy Cameron wrote an open letter to Stephen McNeil pleading to change that. “You need to say “no” to highways and pipelines that increase our use of fossil fuels. Then you need to tackle this short list: increase renewables for Nova Scotian use, not export; shut down coal-fired generating plants; incentivize regenerative agricultural practices; stop clear-cutting and pesticide-spraying; promote afforestation and value-added production; establish a province wide integrated transportation network; and create a net-zero-carbon building programme.”

News brief: Pesticide spraying comes to the city

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No longer strictly a rural issue, a recent approval by the Department of Environment suggests the spraying of chemicals to control vegetation is coming to the railway corridor in downtown Dartmouth and along the Bedford Highway.

Nova Scotia groups call for release of Muskrat Falls land protectors

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The Muskrat Falls development may be far away in Labrador, but it is very much Nova Scotia’s business. That was the message delivered by speakers at a news conference held outside the Emera / Nova Scotia Power offices on Lower Water Street in downtown Halifax this morning. “What we are seeing is massive destruction and genocide for profit. The crown corporation Nalcor is giving itself the legal authority to commit genocide using water as a vehicle for devastation. Once they drown the landscape, methylmercury poisoning is inevitable.  We are talking mass genocide to all vegetation, medicines and all living species. Lives will be lost,” said Michelle Paul.