Wine and beer are no exception. Both appeal to consumer appetites for local and authentic. In Canada, craft beer, made on a small scale and with natural local ingredients, is the fastest growing segment of the beer market and, as Canada’s relatively young wine industry extends its regional reach, a small but growing number of wineries are challenging themselves to produce organically.

Because the results taste good, it’s less a matter of twisting consumers’ arms to make responsible choices than simply giving them what they want. As Heather MacGregor, a spokeswoman for the Liquor Control Board of Ontario, put it, “We respond to what our customers like and this market just continues to grow across the board, on both imports and domestic.” She’s referring to a fourfold increase in organic beer sales and a doubling in organic wine sales in the last four years.

Organic doesn’t capture the full breadth of sustainability which, in the realm of wine and beer, also encompasses energy efficiency in production and reduction in water use, packaging and transport. And while it may feel like a contemporary sensibility, it’s nothing new.

When two Bavarian dukes decreed on April 23, 1516, that the only allowable ingredients in beer were barley, hops and water, they were not really concerned about taste. The so-called Bavarian Purity Law, which gets flaunted on beer labels to this day, was in fact designed to stop brewers from pillaging local wheat and rye crops, a practice that was leading to bread shortages and even starvation, and to reduce illness from additives (whether this was more about consumer safety or protectionism from north German beers that featured weird and wonderful psychoactive herbs remains a matter of debate).

The decree also regulated prices (no more than a penny per litre) and defined the beer-making season (April 23 to September 29) in order to cut back on fires caused by brewing and spoilage for lack of cool storage in the summer months. Although no mention is made of yeast – integral to beer – it’s clear the ingredient was understood as earlier medieval documents regulate yeast-sharing protocols between brewers and bakers.

Efficient brewing

Today, the scant resource in beer-making is water and the energetic challenges are to heat efficiently, recapture heat loss and optimize water purification and bottle-cleaning. Elmira, Ontario-based environmental consulting firm Enviro-Stewards has specialized in beer and wine production. By reducing water and gas consumption, product losses and the use of caustics, wineries and breweries increase their output and minimize their loads on local water treatment facilities. Realizing this, and that reducing industrial water consumption is cheaper than digging more wells, several Canadian municipalities and public utilities have, in the last few years, begun to co-fund environmental assessments and refits.

The City of Guelph and Union Gas, for instance, helped Canadian brewer Sleemans to reduce its water and natural gas consumption by 8 per cent and 20 per cent respectively, boosting the brewery’s output and its bottom line by $330,000 a year, with an annual return on investment of over 100 per cent.

In Europe, Dutch beer giant Heineken has paired with the Austrian government in a “Green Brewery” project whose ultimate objective is carbon-neutral beer. Their pilot project at 500-year-old Göss brewery in southeastern Austria uses a combination of solar thermal systems and residual heat from a nearby sawmill for brewing. Almost all of the brewery’s waste heat is used to warm the municipal water supply and in the winter, outdoor air is used for cooling. External electricity used at the brewery, like all breweries in Austria’s Brau Union group (the country’s biggest beer conglomerate), is renewable.

Such ambitions may be more realizable and at a larger scale in a European context – where, for example, Austria is aiming for energy self-sufficiency by 2050 thanks to its extensive wind and hydropower. But Canadian breweries are making strides as well. One major shift here is towards local production.

When Steve Abrams, co-founder of Mill Street Brewery, decided to launch Ontario’s first organic beer in 2002, he had to import his organic hops from New Zealand and his organic malt from Germany, a painful contradiction for a local craft brewer. In the absence of a Canadian standard, he also had to turn to the U.S. Department of Agriculture for organic certification.

Twelve years later, Mill Street’s organic ale (one of the brewery’s more than 40 beers) accounts for 60 per cent of the company’s sales. The brewery is now one of over 30 craft breweries in Ontario and Abrams is able to source all his ingredients within the province.

Hops on the ups

The boom in craft breweries has, among other things, brought hops back to Ontario following a dry spell that Ontario Hop Growers’ Association vice-president Hugh Brown believes dates back to prohibition. Founded four years ago, his association now comprises roughly 30 commercial hops growers, up from “next to none” five years ago.

Most are producing organically and on a small scale but Brown believes that, given the high local demand, bigger commercial players are soon to enter the market. He sees Ontario’s beer industry undergoing what the province’s wine industry went through a decade ago – a move towards estate production, with ingredients being grown and processed on site, a situation where sustainable practice takes on greater immediacy.

Crannóg Ales, founded in 2000 in British Columbia’s interior, is one such on-farm brewery and the first in Canada to get organic certification. Crannóg brews 1.5 million litres annually: “minuscule” in the words of its co-founder Rebecca Kneen (craft brewery is anything below 40 million litres). For Kneen, who grew up on a farm, it “only made sense” to farm and brew on site. Crannóg grows its own organic hops, propagates its own yeasts, draws its own spring water and has its Prairie barley malted by a local maltster. All spent grains and waste water are used on the farm.

Having found no solar or wind systems practical for its scale of operation, Crannóg’s solution has been to keep its energy needs low by eliminating two of the most energy-intensive processes in beer-making: thermal pasteurization and bottling.

“Why spend so much attention on the ingredients if we’re just going to filter out the goodness and flavour?” asks Kneen. Being non-pasteurized, the beer can’t be sold through the liquor board, but Crannóg has a cult following locally and nobody complains that the beer is only available in kegs or “growlers” (which get cleaned and reused rather than recycled) or that it has to be stored cold because it’s “alive.”

Breaking tradition

Crannóg harbours no dreams of expansion beyond the B.C. border: “One important piece of sustainability is being content at a place of sufficiency,” says Kneen. “Constant growth isn’t necessarily sustainable. When things go industrial, they also become invisible.”

Bill Redelmeier, owner of Southbrook Vineyards in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, is something of a kindred spirit in the world of wine. Southbrook boasts biodynamic, organic and Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certifications – making it unique in Canada.

Biodynamic takes organic farming to another level. Redelmeier, a third-generation farmer, dispenses with fungicides and pesticides, raises sheep for their manure and cultivates wild yeasts and moulds “right out of the sheep’s rear end.” He considers the difference between conventional and organic farming to be one of degree, whereas biodynamic farming is more one of kind. By tolerating low levels of infection in the vineyard, the grapes cultivate thick skins rich in tannins and bio-flavonoids and by using wild yeasts, fermentation takes longer and occurs in unique succession. “It’s the difference between a note and a chord,” he says referring to the taste, adding that Ontario’s two biodynamic wineries take home more than their share of national awards every year.

Redelmeier would like to see far more organic vineyards in Ontario, but understands that risk and expense are real obstacles for most grape growers. Organic vineyards typically yield less than half that of conventional ones and they’re more vulnerable to blights and weather irregularities. When taking the leap to organic, growers often look for advance purchasing commitments from wineries to protect themselves financially.

Nor is it universally agreed that organic is better. J-L Groux, winemaker at Stratus Vineyards, just down the road from Southbrook in Niagara-on-the-Lake, argues that organic doesn’t always correlate with quality or sustainability. Originally from the French Loire with wine-making experience on both continents, Groux talks about the downsides of organic production. Grapes need to be sprayed more often, he says, and that requires more fuel. There’s also the need to occasionally pick grapes prematurely to avoid disease, and in the past, organic sprays such as copper and sulphur have taken a toll on soils.

While not organic, Stratus believes deeply in sustainability, which Groux calls “the overall picture.” The winery, built in 2005, was the first building in Canada and the first winery in the world to get LEED certification – a distinction that applies to both its construction and ongoing operation. Groux talks about a “gentle on the earth” approach – which, along with no use of herbicides, includes largely natural pesticides, compost fertilizers, electro-magnetic sprayers rather than irrigation, bio-fuelled tractors and labour-intensive production that uses gravity rather than pumps. Because the parcels adjacent to Stratus are less than 30 feet away and farmed conventionally, the vineyard is not eligible for organic certification. But even if it were, Groux wouldn’t subject his wines to that corset. For him, the young, experimental culture of winemaking in Canada is what makes it more exciting than in the tradition-bound old world.

Taste trumps

For many winemakers like Groux, the term “sustainable” implies virtues rather than restrictions. California’s Sonoma County is embracing it whole hog, aiming to become America’s first 100 per cent sustainable wine region by 2019. Wine has a long tradition in Sonoma, its vineyards dating back to the 1820s and many still in family hands; it’s also big business, accounting for 60 per cent of the county’s GDP and one in three jobs.

According to Karissa Kruse, president of the Sonoma County Winegrowers, the body behind the sustainability initiative, it seems a logical step to make sure winemaking is sustainable. “The marketplace is going this way,” says Kruse. And she’s right. In its 2014 Culinary Forecast, the U.S. National Restaurant Association cited sustainability as the top trend in food and beverage for the coming decade.

While the initiative is completely voluntary, Kruse says that all of Sonoma’s 1,800 grape growers and almost half its 450 winemakers have opted in. And it’s not just a marketing ploy – the region’s susceptibility to drought makes optimal canopy management, drip irrigation and frost protection vital to survival.

Sustainable breweries and wineries, while growing, still represent a small slice of the total market, a position that seems to foster a healthy mix of solidarity and fierce competition. To expand their market share, they have to work together; to distinguish themselves within the small pack, they have to be creative. This leads to wonderful spinoffs – like the glass jewelry made from Stratus’ bottle shards or the blankets woven from Southbrook’s sheep clip – and community collaborations like Mill Street’s partnership with Earth Day Canada, or eastern Ontario craft brewer Beau’s hiring of homeless youth to drive its delivery vans.

But ultimately, it’s taste buds that drive the market. As Mill Street’s Abrams says, “Our research shows that flavour is the single biggest factor for consumers. The fact that it’s organic is nice but for the vast majority it’s not the number one reason to buy.

The post Organic beer is greener beer appeared first on Corporate Knights.

But for some projects new options are emerging, including innovative social finance tools called community bonds.

Community bonds are essentially debt instruments, or small loans from a non-profit’s network of supporters, used to advance a specific project. The loans are interest bearing and the bonds can be structured to be RRSP eligible. They are different from other bonds because they can only be issued by a non-profit and are accessible to unaccredited investors. Non-profits can use them to fund infrastructure projects, including community power installations and green retrofits, where there is both collateral and a revenue stream. This makes them the ultimate impact investment.

The concept was created by Toronto’s Centre for Social Innovation (CSI) to finance the $6.8-million purchase and retrofit of its second “shared workspace” building. In a four-month flurry of activity CSI offered members the chance to secure a 4 per cent annual return over five years on a minimum $10,000 community bond purchase. The bond issue, secured against the value of the building, allowed CSI to raise $2 million.

Fast forward a year and community bonds are now being adapted by social enterprises of all stripes to get a wide range of community clean energy projects off the ground.

The ZooShare Biogas Co-operative in Ontario, for example, is awaiting approval of what could be an RRSP-eligible bond offering to finance a 500-kilowatt biogas plant at the Toronto Zoo. The biogas – from the anaerobic digestion of animal manure, such as tiger and elephant dung, mixed with local restaurant grease – will generate electricity that will be sold (at a generous rate of 16 cents per kilowatt-hour) into the Ontario grid as part of the province’s feed-in tariff program.

An added benefit is that fertilizer “by-products” from the plant will be sold in stores under the “Zoo Poo” brand, and waste heat from the process will allow year-round growing at a nearby greenhouse. If all goes as planned, investors in this $5-million project can expect an attractive 7 per cent annual return.

Another Ontario co-operative, SolarShare, is following in CSI’s footsteps with plans to use community bonds – or what they’re calling “solar bonds” – to build 600 kilowatts of solar photovoltaic capacity. Clean electricity will be generated via 18 small-scale and community-owned solar installations spread across the province. The bonds also have the potential to be RRSP-eligible.

For both ZooShare and SolarShare to proceed with their projects as initially envisioned, they still require approval from Ontario’s financial services regulator.

The payback of SolarShare bonds, like the ZooShare offering, is alluring – 5 per cent annually over five years. Given current volatility in the stock market and the low yield of government bonds and GICs, community bonds represent a secure and attractive alternative for individuals who want to see their investments have a positive social and environmental impact. Moreover, by enabling infrastructure projects like these, community bonds are creating green jobs and accelerating the transition to a low-carbon economy. Perhaps most importantly, they do this by transforming citizens of average means from volunteers or occasional donors into committed investors.

“This idea of massive public involvement in the ownership and economic benefit of these projects is what we’ve all been working towards for the past 15 years,” says Deb Doncaster, executive director of the Community Power Fund. “All it will take is for one or two of these projects to be successful and the approach will take off.”

The challenge, however, for impact investors wanting to “buy local” is that financial institutions don’t offer community bonds. At the moment, interested investors must identify individual community bond offerings and purchase a bond directly through the issuing organization or, in the case of a self-directed RRSP, bring the investment to the attention of their financial institution.

Over time, the hope is that more financial institutions looking to distinguish themselves and build up goodwill in the marketplace will see value in making community bonds more easily accessible to their customers.

The right fit?

One challenge for social enterprises lies in determining whether a community bond is the right financing tool for them and, if so, how best to structure their offering for maximum uptake.

First, only certain types of bonds can be held within an RRSP account. One such example includes a bond backed by an interest in a mortgage, as in the case of CSI’s offering. Second, non-profits can generally avoid the lengthy and expensive prospectus process when issuing debt (bonds), due to an exemption for charities and “benevolent” societies. This is the case in Ontario and with legislation in most other provinces.

There are exceptions, however, particularly when the non-profit is structured as a cooperative instead of a corporation. If so, and once again using Ontario as the example, the enterprise must comply with additional regulations under the Co-Operative Corporations Act (CCA). This is the case with both ZooShare and SolarShare cooperatives in southern Ontario. Both have adapted the concept of community bonds for community power projects and are awaiting regulatory approval of their respective offering statements.

In such cases, size clearly matters. When the debt offering is relatively large, the CCA requires that the co-operative submit an offering statement to the Financial Services Commission of Ontario, a process that can significantly delay the sale of bonds by several months or longer.

It’s not so much an issue if the co-operative’s offering is small, such as if the debt obligations don’t exceed $1,000 per member annually and total outstanding securities does not exceed $200,000. This is the case with SolarShare, which for now has been limited to selling $1,000 bonds until it receives approval – which is far from certain – of a larger offering that would permit the sale of multiple solar bonds to individual investors.

If the co-op gets that green light, it aims to eventually make those bonds RRSP-eligible. “We are working with the banks to build a process but we’re not there yet,” said SolarShare member relations coordinator Julie Leach.

Regardless of the organizational structure a social enterprise chooses, or the type of community bond it favours, the offering must ultimately be associated with business models that generate sufficient revenue to pay for the operating expenses associated with the capital project and to repay investors’ principal and interest over the course of the specified term.

Realizing the potential of community bonds for community cleantech projects and other initiatives will also require greater social finance literacy among financial institutions, particularly in the case of RRSP-eligible bonds.

The potential is too great to ignore, said Tonya Surman, founding executive director of CSI. “Just imagine a theatre company banding its audiences together to refurbish its stage, or a recreation centre using a bond to build a new skating rink with a solar panelled roof, repaying investors with income from ice-time rentals and solar power, and creating young athletes and renewable energy at the same time.”

Surman is convinced that community bonds can bring back a do-it-yourself culture to co-creating community assets in our own backyards. “They represent a newer, more humane, more collaborative kind of capitalism, one in which we pool our resources for the common good as well as shared gain,” she said.

We are still figuring out how to “scale” this innovation, and certainly there remain regulatory hurdles to overcome, but it is clear that community bonds are here to stay and poised to have a meaningful impact on the world of social finance. K

The Centre for Social Innovation will be releasing a Do-It-Yourself Guide to Community Bonds in February 2012.

The post The rise of local power appeared first on Corporate Knights.

In fact, the environmental NGO (ENGO) staffer had to explain, it was going to be about increasing the diversity of voices within the environmental movement—an issue such organizations have historically failed to recognize.

That’s a problem, says Dong, because at the moment, the predominant voice is likely to be middle-class and white, despite an increasingly diverse population. As the diversity project manager at the Sustainability Network, a Toronto-based ENGO, Dong sometimes finds herself the only non-white attendee at environmental events.

“Most ENGOs today have little diversity and don’t reflect or authentically engage the communities they serve,” she says. For instance, the executive directors of the David Suzuki Foundation (DSF), Greenpeace Canada, Pembina Institute, Sierra Club of Canada and WWF-Canada are all white males.

It’s a North American problem, too. American environmentalists of colour such as Lisa Jackson, head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and Marcelo Bonta, executive director of the Center for Diversity and the Environment in Oregon, have coined the phrase “tyranny of fleece” to highlight the movement’s homogeneity.

Perhaps top ranks aren’t filled with people of colour because ENGOs don’t think diversity is necessary. A 2009 report by Earth Day Canada found ENGOs mistakenly believe visible minorities are not interested in environmental well-being. In a time when mainstream environmental interest is fading—contrast the discourse of the 2008 and 2011 federal elections—ENGOs must extend their reach into diverse communities more than ever.

Looking in the mirror

“The environmental movement is failing,” says geneticist and broadcaster Dr. David Suzuki. “I don’t call myself an environmentalist anymore. It’s time to broaden our tent and realize if we are working for a sustainable society, any group facing terrorism, genocide or war is not going to give a damn about the environment.”

Freelance journalist Ayana Meade agrees that when survival is at stake, environmental issues aren’t top of mind. Meade, who is based in New York, founded the Society of Environmental Journalists’ Diversity Task Force in response to the low percentage of journalists of colour reporting on environmental issues.

“Poor people of colour aren’t going to be concerned with existential happenings like global warming,” says Meade. “The movement needs to connect with their immediate concerns: economic and social development.”

This is vital, since environmental degradation disproportionally impacts people of colour. A 2005 Associated Press study found black Americans are 79 per cent more likely than whites to live in neighbourhoods where industrial pollution is suspected of posing the greatest health danger. While there hasn’t been an equivalent Canadian study, as of January 2011, almost one in five First Nations communities—117 in total—were under drinking water advisories.

For that reason, says Meade, “it’s important the face of the movement is not just a white face. It should reflect the people most affected by these issues.”

To achieve that reflection, ENGOs need to take off their blinders and realize “hunger and poverty are [their] issues,” Suzuki says. “We’ve got to look at issues of equity and peace [because] they work against truly sustainable societies.”

Reflecting the community

When reaching out to ethnic communities, the DSF tries to remind people social justice and the environment are linked. Suzuki uses his own family history as an example.

“My grandparents came to Canada from Japan in the 1900s for the fish,” Suzuki says. “Many in the East Indian community came for the trees and are still involved in farming in the Okanagan. We explain those resources are all heavily under assault. We’re also trying to tell people the way we live means many of the oil companies are going into more extreme areas to drill, impacting the countries many of our immigrants come from.”

Suzuki’s childhood also shows that diverse communities have much to teach environmentalists. He recalls his parents taking pride in a coat they bought for him that was later handed down to each of his three sisters. “The idea of a throwaway society wasn’t a part of my childhood,” he says. “When you’re poor, you make do with whatever you have.”

Dong’s mother, a Chinese immigrant, had a similar upbringing. “She composts, recycles and grows her own food. She was poor when she was young,” she says. Yet Dong’s mother doesn’t self-identify as an environmentalist. Says Dong: “I think about all the people who wouldn’t call themselves environmentalists, yet should be involved with the discourse because they do all [the right] things.”

Following tradition from the motherland can lead to green actions, too. Suzuki recalls visiting a friend’s Italian parents who grow their own vegetables, can their own sauces and make their own sausages.

“They’re living like they did in Italy,” he says. “I said to my friend, ‘This is what we’ve got to rediscover.’ He was kind of embarrassed they’re still clinging to [tradition.] But this is where a huge amount of the movement has got to go: becoming much more local and self-sufficient. Immigrant groups that come here having a much smaller ecological footprint are going to be instructive in how to live with much less of everything.”

To that end, ENGOs need to realize they can have two-way conversations with diverse communities and forge reciprocal relationships.

“Go out to events,” says Dong. “Learn about the culture and ask what people are interested in before you start talking about your organization. We tend to think we know what’s best—it’s almost paternalistic. Don’t think you’re the expert and [that only] they are going to benefit from the discussion.”

Winnie Hwo, a DSF climate change campaigner and award-winning journalist from the Chinese-Canadian media who is active in Vancouver’s Chinese communities, agrees. “Every time we do outreach, it’s a two-way conversation.”

Hwo has found immigrants are “the doers” because they want to save money. “We’re learning from them,” she says. “We need to widen our thinking as environmental activists and tell [immigrants] they’re doing the right thing.”

Dong cautions the alternative to such engagement can be costly and counterproductive.

“We’ve heard from groups who have invested in translation services, and have stacks of literature in their office because no one wants it,” says Dong. “You need to understand whether or not those translations are meaningful to that community. It’s like looking for a job and adjusting your cover letter accordingly.”

That means removing jargon from pamphlets that even native English speakers stumble over. “How do you explain environmental capacity-building?” Dong laughs. “You can do a straight translation but it’s not going to make sense.”

As such, ENGOs are demanding assistance—and Dong is more than happy to provide it via Sustainability Network’s ENGO-geared Environment and Diversity Project. For instance, the network’s Aboriginal training session for ENGO employees in 2009 turned out to be one of its most popular workshops.

“We’re just not informed about the people who really founded this country. There’s this steep learning curve,” she says. “But because there’s an urgency to work on these issues, we want to just fast-track through it. It doesn’t work that way.”

While some feel diversity is an end goal, Dong says it’s a journey that’s never done. “You have to work at it. There’s always something you need to learn. We need to listen to the feedback coming back to us.”

Harpreet Johal, a fellow climate campaigner with DSF, says the feedback she’s seen is a hunger for more environmental information in the Indo-Canadian communities. “They’re really happy when we come knocking on their doors and ask for input on what role we can play,” Johal says. “A lot of people are already doing more than the average person for the environment, just for different reasons.”

She and Hwo are pleasantly surprised at Suzuki’s name recognition in ethnic communities, and enjoy bringing him onto Vancouver’s ethnic radio shows to engage with diverse communities.

“Even though he needs translation, he’s talking directly to the audience. They call in and try to impress him,” Hwo says. “They say things like, ‘Can you tell David I don’t eat meat three days each week, even though he suggests starting with one day a week?’ ”

Hwo and Johal connect with ethnic community leaders who recognize Suzuki’s name and are receptive to the green message. These leaders then spread that message within their neighbourhoods. It’s this type of grassroots effort, experts agree, that will lead to more inclusive and lasting change.

Other shades of green

MELDI
The Multicultural Environmental Leadership Development Initiative (MELDI) is a project housed at the University of Michigan’s School of Natural Resources and Environment. MELDI aims to increase diversity in environmental organizations as well as within the broader environmental movement. It also promotes greater leadership diversity in the environmental field.

MELDI’s faculty and staff conduct research on environmental workforce dynamics and provide resources such as jobs directories, a listing of environmental justice researchers and organizations, and a database of over 200 minority environmental professionals.

Hip Hop Caucus
The Hip Hop Caucus is an American civil and human rights organization that began in 2004. Its vision is to create a more just and sustainable world by engaging more people, particularly youth and people of colour, in the civic and policy making process. With over 650,000 supporters across the U.S., its makeup is quite diverse: 70 per cent are under 40 and 60 per cent are female; a majority are African-American and Latino, with a large white contingent, as well as Asian-American and Native American.

“The environmental movement needs to connect with young people, and the best way to do that is with popular culture,” says Ayana Meade. “Particularly with young people of colour, it’s the hip hop culture.”

Green Change
The Green Change project is an initiative that was started in 2009 to reach out to residents in the Jane-Finch corridor of Toronto on environmental issues. The area has a multicultural population that includes refugees and low-income earners, and it frequently struggles with gang violence. The project trains local youth to talk to residents about reducing waste, conserving energy and other money-saving green ideas.

Sonia Dong says the project is successful because of the grassroots approach. “Other environmental groups were coming out and asking, ‘Why do you have a space heater in your apartment?’ or ‘Why are you opening the window when the heat’s on?’ ” What these other groups didn’t understand, she says, is that residents of community housing [generally] do not have control over the thermostats.

“People are familiar with the youth ambassadors and trust them,” Dong says. As a result, these ambassadors are able to gain more insight into residents’ needs. Resulting initiatives include a green jobs project that will see carpenters providing technical skills training for green renovations.

The post Missing persons appeared first on Corporate Knights.

When thinking of investing in your community, most think of money. But there is more to wealth. A wealthy community is rich with friends, time, beauty, and so much more. It all starts with relationships, so the next time you are out, take the time to mingle, say hello, and chat. Every new relationship is a sound investment in your community.

2. Support Locally-Owned Businesses

When compared, local business has two to four times greater economic benefit for the community than other business. They spend, employ, and donate more locally. So why not support them? By supporting a local farmers market, you will get healthy food, and help build local farms.

See www.livingeconomies.org and www.small-mart.org

3. Become a Volunteer

A community may be financially wealthy, but without volunteers it’s surely a “poor” community. Volunteering builds wealth, whether it’s picking up the trash and talking to your neighbours while you do so, planting trees, or joining your local community association. If you volunteer with Big Brothers Big Sisters, you will be investing in love and friendship for the next generation.

See www.bigbrothersbigsisters.ca

4. Invite Your Neighbours to Grow Food

In Vancouver, two women wanted to grow some food so they invited their neighbours to join them. Thirteen people showed up, and started a tomato sprouting station, built a greenhouse, and held weekend work parties in each other’s yards. Chickens and bees soon followed, along with a real spirit of community.

See www.bit.ly/twoblockdiet

5. Organize a Block Party

When my wife and I organized a block party on our street in Victoria, we knocked on everyone’s door and invited people in person. Everyone brought food and drink for a potluck, and we played an ice-breaker game to get people chatting. People loved it. The whole experience of living on a street feels friendlier once you have socialized with everyone.

See www.quezi.com/13238

6. Create a Public Space

Like the piazzas in Italy, a good public space forms the heart of a community, but many of North America’s cities are lacking neighbourhood hearts, especially in the suburbs. In Portland, neighbours have been investing time to create their own public spaces, re-designing local intersections with street murals, and building public seating and coffee-stands, often, using sustainable methods.

See www.cityrepair.org

7. Make Your Community More Walkable

People like to walk, but it isn’t easy in communities without sidewalks or walkways that are safe and beautiful. We need to invest in “walking audits,” a community process that informs the local council where improvements are needed, and where new walking routes can be created. And we need to organize local traffic calming.

See www.walkscore.com and www.walkableamerica.org/checklist-walkability.pdf

8. Invest In Community Bonds

In downtown Toronto, the Centre for Social Innovation used community bonds to buy a beautiful old 35,000 sq. ft. building that will be home to over 400 people and projects. They issued community bonds to raise $6.5 million to buy and develop the building. And it worked.

9. Join Your Community Association

If it’s well organized, fun, participatory, and positive, a good community association is the best investment. In community association people have a voice, and a way to make improvements happen. Imagine, an organization that inspired every street in the community to hold an annual block party, improve their streets’ safety, and created programs for all age groups.

10. Invest in Inspiration

The Project For Public Spaces (PPS) is an international nonprofit that creates and sustains public places that build communities. The organization has worked in 26 countries to improve parks, markets, streets, transit stations, libraries and countless other places. Jay Walljasper, a fellow of PPS wrote The Great Neighborhood Book, “a Do-it-Yourself Guide to Placemaking.” Treat yourself to some inspiration, and invest time in your public spaces.

See www.pps.org and www.newsociety.com/bookid/3943

Guy Dauncey is the author or co-author of nine books, including The Climate Challenge: 101 Solutions to Global warming (www.theclimatechallenge.ca). He lives in Victoria, BC.

The post 10 ways to invest in community appeared first on Corporate Knights.

Bananas belong in important conversations—in boardrooms, behind closed doors, in city halls.

In fact, your mayor should be thinking about bananas right now. Not because His or Her Worship doesn’t have more important things to consider, or because they might be particularly peckish, but because bananas are a symbol for something greater. Their existence north of the 49th parallel is a testament to globalization. They are beacons of the pre-apocalyptic marketplace, emblems of cheap fossil fuel economies.

In 2030, something as common as the contents of your morning smoothie will be determined by the economic, social, and environmental health of our planet. And the way our cities respond to the complex issues of today will affect the simple joys of its citizens for tomorrow.

Bananas are a thought experiment for the future of the sustainable city.

We asked the mayors of some major cities in Canada a few out-of-the-box questions to get them thinking about their broader visions for the sustainability of their city in the future. In addition to bananas, we asked mayors to think about tree-forts and transit.

Many Canadians take some things for granted—available food, green space, and accessible transportation. In many ways, these issues are influenced by municipal level decision-making. As the climate continues to change and the global population increases, Canadian cities are due for some major adjustments. Over the next few decades, municipal investment in sustainability will carry a lot of weight when it comes to securing something as plain and simple as the fruit on your cereal.

In the year 2030 …

Will you be able to eat bananas in your city?

“Yes. They are greatly appreciated and enjoyed, because they are a treat, much like oranges in the Christmas stocking during WWII. Prices for tropical fruits have increased significantly, but because of Whitehorse’s proximity to the Pacific, we are still able to get tropical fruits like bananas for a reasonable cost more often than other communities. However, Yukon agriculture has grown considerably in 20 years time, so while we may not be growing local bananas, we are growing a wide variety of fruits and vegetables and have a number of vibrant markets providing a diversity of locally-grown products year-round.”

—Mayor Bev Buckway, Whitehorse, Yukon Territory

“Of course. Not only will they be available from around the world, but having completed our Community Energy project in 2017 (drawing geothermal heat from a long-abandoned mine and supplementing it with biomass boilers from a newly established local wood pellet industry) locally produced bananas will be available from the recently established farms and orchards underground at another local abandoned mine*. The community, by 2030, will benefit immensely from the new community garden focusing on efforts toward sustaining our 100-mile diet opportunity.”

—Mayor Gordon Van Tighem, Yellowknife, Northwest Territory

*Mayor Van Tighem notes that the idea of a subterranean garden is, at this stage, purely an interesting concept in Yellowknife, but at least one is in operation in Tokyo, Japan.

Will the city’s children have tree-forts?

“I believe they will. The Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) is so committed to the environment that we plant several thousand trees each year in our own right. As well, we require developers of subdivisions to deed green spaces over for public use and to plant at least one tree per new lot. And it doesn’t end there. We are preparing an Urban Forest Master Plan, which will be a blueprint for the conservation and promotion of a healthy urban forest on both public and private land in (HRM). We pride ourselves on being among the greenest communities in Canada and, somewhere in all that greenery, I’m confident you will always find youngsters busy playing.”

—Mayor Peter Kelley, Halifax, Nova Scotia

What will be the best way to get around the city?

“In 20 years, my hope is that we have an efficient, sustainable transportation network that combines excellent transit, safe cycling and pedestrian routes, and zero-emission cars and trucks. Our 2020 goal is to exceed 50 per cent of commutes by walk/bike/transit and we’re on track. We need ongoing investment in all green options: rapid transit, buses, separated bike lanes, pedestrian corridors, and electric vehicle infrastructure.”

—Mayor Gregor Robertson, Vancouver, British Columbia

“Public transit will play a vital role in Calgary 20 years from now. Better transit is the answer to much of what ails the modern city including issues of pollution, congestion, and a lack of social inclusion.”

—Mayor Naheed Nenshi, Calgary, Alberta

“The year 2030 will no doubt call for significant change from current and past practices in terms of existing transportation habits such as the role of private cars. There will also be changes in design of our landscapes and transportation funding. In 20 years the fastest way to travel around our city will be a combination of existing and improved infrastructure that promotes inter-modal connections in Charlottetown and our neighboring municipalities.”

—Mayor Clifford Lee, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island

The post The city’s gone bananas appeared first on Corporate Knights.

These eggs could be sold the day they’re laid, but not beyond the front gates of the small, organic farms that produce them. According to the Ontario Ministry of Food and Agricultural Affairs, all eggs retailed beyond the farm gate must be graded for quality. It can take up to three days for eggs from the farm to reach grocery stores.

Likewise, farms that have more than 99 laying hens must pay for a certain share in the production market. For farms trying to meet growing demand, this can cost hundreds of dollars per hen, depending on the province. This makes farm-fresh eggs even less available to consumers.

A February 2010 Globe and Mail article reports that this has created a hushed underground market, where farm-fresh eggs are kept out of sight and access is limited to people who “know the password.”

For those not in the know, the lack of farm-fresh eggs in mainstream markets makes “backyard chickens”—hens raised privately in individual backyards—an attractive alternative. Tom Henry, editor of Small Farm Canada, says once people taste the alternative, “industrial chickens and eggs don’t look good. People are asking for free-range or organic, but the bulk of eggs in the supermarkets are not.”

“Mary,” who asked her real name not be used, bought her first backyard chicken in 2007, even though it’s currently illegal to raise backyard chickens in Toronto. But, Mary, owner of torontochickens.com, was frustrated with the lack of alternatives. Motivated by concerns for food security, animal welfare, and the disparity between consumers and food producers, she turned to urban chickens as a way of taking control.

“We’re so dependent on food labels to understand what’s in our food because we don’t know where it’s made,” says Mary. Even certified organic labels aren’t enough to guarantee quality. In Mary’s opinion, having backyard hens means “being able to control the quality [yourself].”

Egg Farmers of Canada, the national marketing agency for eggs, claims the contrary. With recent listeriosis and avian flu outbreaks, consumers are increasingly concerned for the safety and regulation of eggs, says Laurent Souligny, the agency’s chairman. “And that’s what we spend a lot of time on. We want to make sure the eggs get to the consumer, and that they are safe to eat.”

However, factory farming exacerbates the risks of virulent strains of avian flu in the poultry industry, according the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In recent avian flu cases, the existence of food safety standards failed to prevent outbreaks, and overcrowded animal conditions foster the spread of pandemics.

These impacts are pushing concerned consumers towards organic options. According to Agriculture Canada, Canadian egg consumption has dropped over the past decade, but sales of organic and free-range eggs are increasing every year by nearly 20 percent.

Beyond the panic for organic, people still want backyard hens.

Bill Bruce, head of the City of Calgary’s bylaw services, says that Calgary’s city council is currently revisiting a backyard livestock ban. “There’s been a real swing in what the public wants. There’s a whole movement towards [sustainability], and backyard hens are a part of [that].”

Although consumers may be more focused on sustainability, urban hens aren’t always viable. The City of Vancouver addressed potential concerns when reviewing its ban on backyard chickens in March 2009. A draft bylaw outlines—among other specifics—that owners must provide basic animal healthcare, and nuisance complaints and humane animal treatment will be regulated by animal control services and the B.C. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. The new bylaw could be implemented as early as April 2010.

These changes in Calgary and Vancouver are a sign of progress, says Mary, but she is skeptical as to whether urbanizing egg production will make a dent in conventional egg sales.

The post City chickens, country eggs appeared first on Corporate Knights.