The Straight Goods Report

Take action, Canada, for the basics: electricity, health care, oil, chocolate, teddy bears, and more

Editorial by: Straight Goods Publisher, Ish Theilheimer

  For better or worse, Canadians often have as much or more influence as consumers as they have as citizens. Some think that's an awful and materialistic thing. Others - such as people who run giant corporations - are quite aware of this reality and work like crazy not to get clobbered by consumer power.
  Take Talisman Energy, for instance. It's Canada's biggest independent oil company and a major international player, which is good. What's not so good is that it's heavily involved in Sudan, an African country run by a dictatorship involved in a civil war has killed hundreds of thousands. And many - from church leaders to Canada's foreign minister John Manley - believe Talisman is fueling that war.
  Manley wrings his hands and says there's little government can do, as SG contributor and pen-pal Penney Kome pointed out to me in an e-mail post-script to her article about attending last week's Talisman AGM in Calgary. Maybe, maybe not! But there is plenty that consumers can do. That's the reason Talisman is going to such great lengths to whitewash its record of corporate responsibility, as Paul Pellizari reports. He asks "How do we vote Talisman off the Island?" Straight Goods responds: consumer pressure. Visit the websites of organizations to which Penney and Paul have supplied links for ideas of how you, as a consumer, can move Talisman to real action - like getting out of Sudan.
  Then there's the painful subject of chocolate. No other food has created so many holidays. Think about it: Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day, Hallowee'n, and Christmas would hardly exist without it, not to mention birthdays and dating. Many of us have difficulty doing a day without chocolate. I have this friend who...
  So it came as a real shock to read Carole Pearson's article detailing the extent to which chocolate is produced by slaves - in the year 2001. Although most is not, enough is - from Ivory Coast plantations - that it's likely to be mixed up in ALL commercial chocolate. There's an enormous supply from there - it's the world's biggest producer of cocoa - and up to 90% of its one million plantations may rely on slaves - boys and young men, kidnapped, beaten and forced to work in inhuman conditions up to 18 hours a day.
  Feel hungry still? Carole's article supplies links to organizations that offer ways to use your consumer power to fight slavery.
  Meanwhile, you can either wait and look for the appearance of fair trade chocolate companies like La Siembra. And/or you can let chocolate companies like Nestle, Cadbury, Mars and Hershey know that you don't want chocolate produced by slave labour. Demand to know where and how they purchase cocoa and what they're doing to ensure chocolate doesn't have any slavery in it.
  In other consumer news, Ontario residents are advised to hold on tight to their wallets. Myron Gordon and John Wilson make the shocking case that your hydro bills will go through the roof under the Harris government's current privatization scheme - especially leasing the Bruce reactor, as planned.
  Then there's Harris' new zeal for publicly promoting what everyone knows he's always believed in - private health care. Linda McQuaig and Dave Barrett present some scarey detail of what the real world of two-tier medicine looks like. It's coming at you fast.
  One item deserving of special mention is the Free Jaggi Singh e-mail petition, launched by our partner rabble.ca, is snowballing. I've received 10 copies personally. Check it out and sign on. And while you're at it check out the cartoon the petition inspired: Teddy Bears' Picnic by our inspired animator Jim Kempkes. Please pass both URLs around to all your list.
  Finally, Straight Goods' next big project: As you may know, we're facilitating the on-line discussion at Ed Broadbent and Des Morton's Future of Social Democracy conference at McGill University in Montreal May 25-26. It's a conference they were forced to hold after some ruminations about its possibility made it to the Globe's front page in December. This week we'll be posting the conference's Forum pages and launching forums and on-line opinion surveys - in both official languages - in connection with the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada and the Douglas-Coldwell Foundation.
  It's looking like a busy spring. It rained on the other day and now the dandelions are out. This Canadian consumer has a garden to put in, a dump run to make, a lawn mower to find - and a little power to wield. Let's wield it together.

Ish Theilheimer lives on a farm near Killaloe in Eastern Ontario and is Publisher of Straight Goods.

The Straight Goods Report is a new weekly column being distributed to newspapers, web 'zines and portals, and radio stations all over Canada. You need not ask permission to reproduce it in your print or web publication, but please include our URL and let us know where you are posting it.

- Ish Theilheimer
- Killaloe, Ontario
- May 07, 2001
- ish@straightgoods.com

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