David Suzuki

Government must do more to address First Nations' water woes

David Suzuki — Tue, 14 Feb 2017 23:44:42 +0000

Neskantaga First Nation in Ontario has had to boil water since 1995. "We're over 20 years already where our people haven't been able to get the water they need to drink from their taps or to bathe themselves without getting any rashes," Neskantaga Chief Wayne Moonias told CBC News in 2015. Their water issues have yet to be resolved.

Understanding climate change means reading beyond headlines

David Suzuki — Tue, 07 Feb 2017 23:27:40 +0000

Seeing terms like "post-truth" and "alternative facts" gain traction in the news convinces me that politicians, media workers and readers could benefit from a refresher course in how science helps us understand the world. Reporting on science is difficult at the best of times. Trying to communicate complex ideas and distill entire studies into eye-catching headlines and brief stories can open the door to misinformation and limited understanding.

Indigenous people are fighting for us all

David Suzuki — Tue, 31 Jan 2017 23:28:09 +0000

In the 1990s, the David Suzuki Foundation embarked on a program to develop community economic projects with coastal First Nations. Between 1998 and 2003, my wife and foundation co-founder, Tara Cullis, established relationships with 11 coastal communities from the tip of Vancouver Island to Haida Gwaii and Alaska, visiting each several times.

She encountered unemployment and a desperate need for jobs and economic development in every community. Then came pressure for pipeline projects and court-mandated consultation with First Nations. Federal and provincial governments began offering huge financial incentives for pipeline approvals. But opposition remained strong because some things are more important than money.

We need to work less to live better

David Suzuki — Tue, 24 Jan 2017 23:25:09 +0000

Since the 1950s, almost everything about work in the developed world has changed dramatically. Rapid technological advances continue to render many jobs obsolete. Globalization has shifted employment to parts of the world with the lowest costs and standards. Most households have gone from one income-earner to at least two. Women have fully integrated into the workforce, albeit often with less-than-equal opportunities, conditions and pay. A lot of our work is unnecessary and often destructive -- depleting resources, destroying ecosystems, polluting air, water and soil, and fuelling climate change.

Anthropocentric view ignores crucial connections

David Suzuki — Tue, 17 Jan 2017 23:13:09 +0000

For decades, scientists have warned that we're on a dangerous path. It stems from our delusion that endless growth in population, consumption and the economy is possible and is the very purpose of society. But endless growth is not feasible in a finite biosphere. Growth is not an end but a means.

We can learn so much from nature

David Suzuki — Tue, 10 Jan 2017 23:12:10 +0000

If you fly over a forest and look down, you'll see every green tree and plant reaching to the heavens to absorb the ultimate energy source: sunlight. What a contrast when you look down on a city or town with its naked roofs, asphalt roads and concrete sidewalks, all ignoring the sun's beneficence! Research shows we might benefit by thinking more like a forest.

Solar roads could be a step in that direction. Roads, sidewalks and parking lots cover massive areas. Using them to generate power means less environmental disturbance, as no new land is needed to house solar power operations.

It's time to heed warnings about humanity's collision course

David Suzuki — Tue, 03 Jan 2017 23:22:41 +0000

The longer we delay addressing environmental problems, the more difficult it will be to resolve them. Although we've known about climate change and its potential impacts for a long time, and we're seeing those impacts worsen daily, our political representatives are still approving and promoting fossil fuel infrastructure as if we had all the time in the world to slow global warming.

We can't say we weren't warned. In 1992, a majority of living Nobel prize-winners and more than 1,700 leading scientists worldwide signed a remarkable document called "World Scientists' Warning to Humanity."

Tread lightly to lift the weight of the world

David Suzuki — Tue, 13 Dec 2016 23:16:14 +0000

How much stuff will you give and receive this holiday season? Add it to the growing pile -- the 30-trillion-tonne pile. That's how much technology and goods humans have produced, according to a study by an international team led by England's University of Leicester. It adds up to more than all living matter on the planet, estimated at around four trillion tonnes.

Indigenous people hold the key to caribou survival

David Suzuki — Tue, 06 Dec 2016 23:14:44 +0000

When government biologists in Canada want to learn where caribou are, they put radio-tracking collars on some animals and monitor their movements. This gives them a rough idea of where herds are and where they travel, but it doesn’t tell them much about a caribou population's history -- travel routes before their habitat was degraded or historical feeding, breeding and calving spots.

Reconciliation requires recognizing rights-based fishing

David Suzuki — Tue, 29 Nov 2016 23:24:51 +0000

Fishing is as emblematic to Canada as ice hockey. It's also a way of life with a long tradition in coastal Indigenous communities. But since European contact, it's been all but eliminated as an economic development opportunity for them.

As Canada struggles to come to terms with reconciliation, court cases are helping define what Indigenous rights and title mean in day-to-day life. If the federal government is serious about its commitment to a new and respectful relationship with Indigenous peoples, it should set the tone through policies that address historic injustices, such as in commercial fishing practices.

Better discourse for a kinder world

David Suzuki — Wed, 23 Nov 2016 01:18:13 +0000

The U.S. election was a chilling illustration of the atrocious state of public discourse. It doesn't bode well for a country once admired for leadership in education and science.

As public relations expert and former David Suzuki Foundation board chair James Hoggan writes in I’m Right and You’re an Idiot, "polluted public discourse is an enormous obstacle to change." How, he asks, do we "create the space for higher quality public debates where passionate opposition and science shape constructive, mind-changing conversations?"

Hard work and love trump fear and hate

David Suzuki — Tue, 15 Nov 2016 23:57:35 +0000

Now what? Many people in the United States and around the world are dismayed that a bigoted, misogynistic, climate change denier has been elected to the highest office in what is still the world's most powerful nation. His party controls the House and Senate, meaning pro-fossil-fuel, anti-climate-action representatives who reject overwhelming and alarming scientific evidence will hold the reins. It will be a government firmly in the pocket of the fossil fuel industry. But global warming isn't going to pause for four years. It's going to accelerate. Do we give up?

Extinction crisis signals that it's time to change course

David Suzuki — Tue, 08 Nov 2016 22:40:09 +0000

Clean air, water and soil to grow food are necessities of life. So are diverse plant and animal populations. But as the human population continues to increase, animal numbers are falling. There's a strong correlation. A comprehensive report from the World Wildlife Federation and the Zoological Society of London found that wild animal populations dropped by 58 per cent between 1970 and 2012, and will likely reach a 67 per cent drop by 2020 if nothing is done to prevent the decline.

'World class' may not mean much when it comes to oil spill response

David Suzuki — Tue, 01 Nov 2016 23:51:13 +0000

In July, a pipeline leak near Maidstone, Saskatchewan, spilled about 250,000 litres of diluted oil sands bitumen into the North Saskatchewan River, killing wildlife and compromising drinking water for nearby communities, including Prince Albert. It was one of 11 spills in the province over the previous year.

In October, a tugboat pulling an empty fuel barge ran aground near Bella Bella on the Great Bear Rainforest coastline, spilling diesel into the water. Stormy weather caused some of the containment booms to break. Shellfish operations and clam beds were put at risk and wildlife contaminated.

Heated debates ignore an overheating planet

David Suzuki — Tue, 25 Oct 2016 22:16:38 +0000

Scientists worldwide accept that Earth is warming at an unusually rapid rate, that humans are primarily responsible, mainly by burning fossil fuels, and that the consequences for humanity will be disastrous if we don't take immediate, widespread action. The U.S. Defense Department calls climate change a security risk "because it degrades living conditions, human security and the ability of governments to meet the basic needs of their populations."

Food security is important for humans and other animals

David Suzuki — Tue, 18 Oct 2016 22:27:53 +0000

As leaves change colour and drop from trees, and a chill in the air signals the approach of winter, many of us are thinking of the fall harvest and hearty soups and dishes that will soon warm our bellies.

Not everyone is lucky enough to enjoy such thoughts. About four million Canadians -- including more than a million children -- lack food security, defined as reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable, nutritious food. In Canada, people from low-income households and Indigenous communities are the most likely to suffer from food insecurity.

We can't dig our way out of the fossil fuels pit

David Suzuki — Tue, 11 Oct 2016 22:34:14 +0000

I've often thought politicians inhabit a parallel universe. Maybe it's just widespread cognitive dissonance, coupled with a lack of imagination, that compels them to engage in so much contradictory behaviour. Trying to appease so many varying interests isn't easy.

Rather than focusing on short-term economic and corporate priorities, though, politicians should first consider the long-term health and well-being of the people they're elected to represent. When it comes to climate change and fossil fuels, many aren't living up to that.

Confronting the crisis of violence against Indigenous women and girls in Canada

David Suzuki — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 22:43:29 +0000

In late September, Inuit artist Annie Pootoogook died tragically in Ottawa. Pootoogook was an award-winning illustrator from Cape Dorset, Nunavut. Her ink-and-crayon depictions of everyday life in the north -- families sitting to eat a meal of seal meat or shopping at the Arctic co-op -- received international acclaim. In contrast to the idealized vision many Canadians have of the north, of majestic rock and ice landscapes or charismatic wildlife like polar bears, Pootoogook's drawings often reflected the crushing poverty northern families face and its devastating impacts on their health and well-being.

Carbon dioxide: Pollutant or plant food?

David Suzuki — Tue, 27 Sep 2016 22:15:01 +0000

Life evolved to live within limits. It's a delicate balance. Humans need oxygen, but too much can kill us. Plants need nitrogen, but excess nitrogen harms them, and pollutes rivers, lakes and oceans. Ecosystems are complex. Our health and survival depend on intricate interactions that ensure we get the right amounts of clean air, water, food from productive soils and energy from the sun.

Wild Pacific salmon face an upstream battle for survival

David Suzuki — Tue, 20 Sep 2016 22:14:41 +0000

Salmon have been swimming in Pacific Northwest waters for at least seven million years, as indicated by fossils of large saber-tooth salmon found in the area. During that time, they've been a key species in intricate, interconnected coastal ecosystems, bringing nitrogen and other nutrients from the ocean and up streams and rivers to spawning grounds, feeding whales, bears and eagles and fertilizing the magnificent coastal rainforests along the way. For as long as people have lived in the area, salmon have been an important food source and have helped shape cultural identities.

Airline emissions are flying too high

David Suzuki — Tue, 13 Sep 2016 21:57:52 +0000

In July, Solar Impulse 2 became the first airplane to fly around the world without using fuel. At the same time, the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration has been working on electric planes. These developments mean air travel and transport could become more environmentally friendly, with less pollution and fewer greenhouse gas emissions, and planes would be quieter.

The simple-minded nature of human super predators

David Suzuki — Tue, 06 Sep 2016 22:17:27 +0000

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Humans are the world's top predator. The way we fulfil this role is often mired in controversy, from factory farming to trophy hunting to predator control. The latter is the process governments use to kill carnivores like wolves, coyotes and cougars to stop them from hunting threatened species like caribou -- even though human activity is the root cause of caribou's decline.

In diversity, there is strength

David Suzuki — Tue, 30 Aug 2016 22:25:04 +0000