Editorial

P , . After two world wars, thrift and reuse in the North American economy had become a regular practice. The wars encouraged recycling eff orts as a means to save in-demand materials for the military. For example, the bottling industry was remarkably effi cient at recycling containers at low cost. The bottles were hand stamped by the company producing them to mark ownership and the business would use a deposit-refund system to ensure consumers returned the bottles after consumption. They

were consistently cleaned, refi lled, capped and returned to the market after use.

Although the industry was effi cient and sustainable, it was also diffi cult to grow — for many politicians and economists at the time, that was a problem. As a result, plastic production was a useful solution for the packaging industry’s stagnation.

Editor of U.S. magazine Modern Packaging Lloyd Stouff er famously said in while addressing the Society of the Plastics Industry conference in New York, “The future of plastics is in the trash can […] It [is] time for the plastics industry to stop thinking about ‘reuse’ packages and concentrate on single use. For the package that is used once and thrown away, like a tin can or a paper carton, represents not a one-shot market for a few thousand units, but an everyday recurring market measured by the billions of units.”

Stouff er saw plastic use as a never-ending source for profi t in the packaging industry and his speech in New York has been etched in gold since single-use plastics ascended to the dirty throne. Now, Canada’s packaging sector accounts for per cent of total demand in plastic production, dwarfi ng the construction and automotive sectors.

With the rise of single-use plastics, the problem about where to put them p o s t- co n su mp t io n f o l l o w e d . O n l y

about per cent of Canada’s annual plastic waste is diverted from landfi lls and even less is recycled. So, where does the other per cent go? A good portion of it is dumped into the environment where it concentrates into microplastics that adversely aff ect the health of the land.

In Canada, environmental laws are regulated by a permission-to-pollute system that sets abstract thresholds for the land’s assimilative capacity — a term used to indicate how much industries can pollute before it causes damage to the land, water or air. These views of the land reduce it to a resource meant to be exploited by the ambitions of industry, not the continuity of ecological health. These same thresholds are the ones destroying the health of communities lining the Athabasca River downstream from the oilsands in Alberta. Tailings ponds holding toxic carcinogenic minerals like arsenic are leaking into the river, elevating cancer rates in Indigenous communities. According to Canadian regulations, arsenic levels in the Athabasca River are reportedly normal, but the line between normal and dangerous is diffi cult to tell. Health Canada notes that . milligrams of arsenic per litre of drinking water is safe — however, a level of . milligrams is apparently dangerous. Worse yet, a lot of Canada’s waste is

s h i p p e d away to economically subjugated nations with less environmental regulations. Canada and corporations operating within its borders often pay these nations or other waste disposal companies to manage the issue for them. This waste is often burnt or dumped with little regard for local populations.

In , the world watched after the Philippines threatened to send containers of household waste back to Canada. Offi cials claimed that over containers were sent to the Philippines between and . Many containers were disposed, but the containers shipped back were fi lled with dirty diapers, household waste and hazardous electronic waste and were forced to rot on the ports for years after the company that shipped the contents falsely labelled them as recyclables.

Whether we degrade Indigenous lands on our own continent or ship waste out of the sight of settlers’ view, both methods are colonialism in action. The ever-expanding production of plastics means that more and more land will need to be exploited for the p r o d u c t s of our v e r y con-

sumption, simply as a means to discard them. In many ways, colonialism is like a snake eating its own tail.

As geographer Max Liboiron claims in their new book Pollution is Colonialism, “Whether motivated by profi t and growth or environmental conservation, both approaches to waste and wasting are premised on an assumed entitlement to Indigenous Land.”

Canada’s waste policies are textbook examples of colonialism. The reason our cities aren’t overfl owing with plastics and waste is primarily because they are shipped away from our sight. However, this doesn’t mean they don’t exist — it just means land elsewhere is being expropriated to make room for settlers’ ambitions.

COMMENT

T N A L ’ S , - , C , U.S. M . A Canadian delegation led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau emphasized issues like climate change, pandemic recovery and the supply chain, but the elephant in the room was U.S. President Joe Biden’s protectionist policies which may have great impacts on the Canadian auto-manufacturing industry. Such aspects of Biden’s Build Back Better Framework are putting the historic friendship fostered by each leader in doubt.

Trudeau, alongside four of his federal cabinet ministers, headed to Washington, D.C. for meetings with fellow North American leaders. All three heads of government — Trudeau, Biden and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador — share similar centrist political ideologies and were able to fi nd common ground in certain areas. The so-called three amigos announced agreements that will ease the current supply chain crunch, enhance regional vaccine distribution and reduce methane emissions, but tensions due to Biden’s plan to rebuild American manufacturing remain vehement.

The Biden administration’s Build Back Better bill aims to create jobs and counter the climate crisis by using money raised through taxes imposed on large national corporations, the wealthy, stocks and international companies. The bill — which was approved by the U.S. House of Representatives and awaits approval from the U.S. Senate — makes up to US , in tax credits available for consumers buying electric vehicles (EVs) that include American-made batteries manufactured in unionized factories which will adversely aff ect the Canadian and Mexican auto industries.

Due to Canada’s historic dependency on exports from the U.S. market, protectionist policies tend to have a great economic impact on Canadians. Currently, per cent of vehicles are exported from the U.S. and although companies such as Ford are assembling cars in Ontario, the Canadian government fears the tax credits undermine their eff orts to produce EVs.

Canadian Minister Mary Ng — one of the four ministers included in the Canadian delegation attending the summit — expressed her concerns about the tax credits in a letter to U.S. legislators stating they “would have a major adverse impact on the future of EV and automotive production in Canada.” According to Ng, imposing such a tax credit would lead to the loss of tens of thousands of jobs in a signifi cant Canadian manufacturing sector. Ng also suggested that, due to the highly integrated automotive industry in both nations, the U.S. would also be susceptible to economic repercussions. But the possibility of an economic fallout is not the only lobbying strategy the Canadian delegation used to plead its case.

According to the Canadian government, the tax credit would violate the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) and the government has indicated it will respond accordingly if it is imposed. Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland warned the tax credits could become a dominant issue in bilateral relations with the U.S. Meanwhile, Trudeau noted the U.S. government was aware of the Canadian concerns and repercussions while also indicating they are going to push through various ways to fi nd a solution for this problem. For its part, the White House remained fi rm in its stance that the tax credit does not violate USMCA provisions. When asked about the matter at a press conference, Biden stated he would wait until the legislation is approved by the U.S. Senate to consider changes for Canada.

Though the Canadian delegation allegedly applied a “Team Canada” approach that stressed Canadian interests, it fell short of successfully lobbying an amendment to the Build Back Better bill. Although Canadian government offi cials expected the election of a new president to ease

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the Trump-era tensions, Biden’s protectionist policies will take a toll on Canadians if a solution is not reached.

Canada is often described as the U.S.’s closest friend and ally, but Canada is suff ering the repercussions of economic dependence on the U.S. In a continuously growing and interconnected world where geographic location is no longer a major factor in ensuring reciprocal trade, Canada should expand its horizons if its alleged ally is unable to off er a more benefi cial partnership.